Contrarily to the widely-held opinion, the addition pattern issuing from the high temperature fluorination of single wall carbon nanotubes does not consist of a distribution of exo-addends on the outer surface of a tube. Instead, fluorotubes possess a varied bonding scheme consisting of graphite fluoride-like, fluorofullerene-like and internally 'addended' sections. (C) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.