The cleaning of transition metals including copper, nickel and iron from silicon surfaces at ambient temperature was demonstrated using various thermal beams. Sputter-deposited copper was found in two forms on silicon surfaces : uniformly dispersed copper and copper islands. At room temperature, a ClF3 beam removed the uniformly dispersed copper, but not the copper islands. Since copper-halides are not volatile at room temperature, the observation of uniformly dispersed copper removal suggested the formation of a volatile silicon-copper-halogen species. To remove the copper islands, a hot thermal dichlorosilane SiCl2H2 (DCS) beam which pyrolytically produces SiCl2 was used as a reactive silicon source. The DCS beam alone deposited SiClx on wafer surfaces suppressing complete copper removal. Exposure of this surface to ClF3 removed the SiClx deposition and copper islands from the wafer surface at room temperature. Beams containing DCS + Cl-2 or DCS + F-2 in which the F-2 or Cl-2 was also pyrolytically dissociated at 1000 degrees C to form F and Cl atoms, were tested. The combination of DCS with Cl-2 at a beam temperature of 1000 degrees C reduced the deposition rate, but did not remove all of the copper islands from the wafer surface. A F-2 beam at 1000 degrees C alone did not remove the SiClx deposition as ClF3 did; however, the mixed DCS + F-2 beam at 1000 degrees C removed copper to below the detection limit of x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy without any observable deposition. These results validated the proposed copper removal mechanism in which a volatile copper-halogen-silicon compound was formed. The mixed DCS + F-2 beam was also capable of removing other transition metals such as nickel and iron at room temperature.