Desorption is one of the mechanisms of lubricant loss from the surfaces of data storage media. This work has studied the desorption of monodisperse samples of a typical perfluoropolyalkyl ether lubricant, Fomblin Zdol, from the surface of graphite. Desorption is observed to occur molecularly through a first-order process with an energy barrier to desorption, AE, that is independent of coverage but is dependent on molecular weight. The DeltaE(des)(double dagger) of 994 and 1329 g/mole fractions were found to be 128 +/- 2 kJ/mol and 155 +/- 2 kJ/mol, respectively. The pre-exponents, upsilon, of the first-order desorption rate constant were found to have values of 10(19.6 +/-0.3) s(-1) and 10(21.1 +/-0.3) s(-1) for the 994 and 1329 g/mole Zdol fractions, respectively. These results clearly reveal the chain length dependence of the DeltaE(des)(double dagger), and the high values of the pre-exponents are similar to those observed for desorption of other oligomeric species from graphite.