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Yes. Figure AI says it retired much of its F.02 humanoid-robot fleet by training the robots to jump autonomously into a 75-ton electric-arc furnace at a foundry in Imatra, Finland. The company has not disclosed how many robots were melted.
What happened to Figure’s F.02 robots?
On September 30, 2026, Figure AI described a deliberately dramatic retirement for its older F.02 humanoid robots: they leapt into molten steel and were melted down. Figure said its newer F.03 fleet was growing, and keeping the F.02 machines no longer made sense. The company also said disassembling them by hand would take technical staff away from work needed for the F.04 launch. Figure’s F.02 Decommission announcement presented the event as real, not staged footage.
Figure put it plainly: “In an age of AI-generated footage, it’s worth being clear: we really trained robots to jump autonomously, shipped them to Finland, and had them leap into a vat of molten steel.”
Were the robots remote-controlled?
Figure says the jumps were autonomous, rather than robots being steered remotely for each leap. Training started at the company’s San Jose campus, where engineers used large airbags while teaching the machines to jump from a second floor. Figure says the movement drew on stunt-artist references and that engineers trained an AI model in simulation to target a furnace the robots had not previously encountered.
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At the foundry, Figure says the robots’ policies kept operating despite extreme heat, electromagnetic fields, and failures of cameras and other electronics. The announcement describes the autonomy and training process, but does not provide an independent technical evaluation or detailed safety-system account.
Where was the furnace, and how did the melting work?
The send-off took place at a foundry in Imatra, Finland, using a 75-ton electric-arc furnace powered by three graphite electrodes. Figure said the team had 24 hours and six melts to complete the work. Each melt offered a 20-minute window before cooling steel formed a hard crust.
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Figure also said Arnold Schwarzenegger suggested melting the robots after the company asked the internet for farewell ideas, and that he participated in the filmed send-off. The resulting Terminator-like scene was therefore both a retirement method and a public farewell.
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Figure cited two practical reasons: the F.02 generation was being superseded as the F.03 fleet expanded, and manual disassembly would consume engineering time needed for the F.04 launch. It also cited proprietary hardware as a reason not to leave retired machines intact. The announcement does not detail the hardware involved or compare melting with other disposal options.
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How many robots were melted, and what happened to the metal?
Figure has not stated the exact number of F.02 robots melted in its announcement. It says the recovered metal bars were sent to the United States and are being machined into a limited series of commemorative artifacts. The announcement links to a purchase option, but availability and inventory are not guaranteed by the information provided there.
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