Can't convert RTF files

[sglinert]

I have about 4000 fanfiction books in rtf format, and I can't get any of them to convert to ePub. Well, I should say that I tried a random sample of 50 books, and I get the same error code each time.

Here is the error info.
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ERROR: Conversion Error: <b>Failed</b>: Convert book 1 of 1 (Abandoned)

Convert book 1 of 1 (Abandoned)
Resolved conversion options
calibre version: 0.7.1
{'asciiize': False,
'author_sort': None,
'authors': None,
'base_font_size': 0.0,
'book_producer': None,
'change_justification': u'original',
'chapter': u"//*[((name()='h1' or name()='h2') and re:test(., 'chapter|book|section|part\\s+', 'i')) or @class = 'chapter']",
'chapter_mark': u'pagebreak',
'comments': None,
'cover': None,
'debug_pipeline': None,
'disable_font_rescaling': False,
'dont_split_on_page_breaks': False,
'extra_css': None,
'extract_to': None,
'flow_size': 1640,
'font_size_mapping': None,
'footer_regex': u'(?i)(?<=<hr>)((\\s*<a name=\\d+></a>((<img.+?>)*<br>\\s*)?\\d+<br>\\s*.*?\\s*)|(\\s* <a name=\\d+></a>((<img.+?>)*<br>\\s*)?.*?<br>\\s*\\d+))(?=<br>)' ,
'header_regex': u'(?i)(?<=<hr>)((\\s*<a name=\\d+></a>((<img.+?>)*<br>\\s*)?\\d+<br>\\s*.*?\\s*)|(\\s* <a name=\\d+></a>((<img.+?>)*<br>\\s*)?.*?<br>\\s*\\d+))(?=<br>)' ,
'input_encoding': None,
'input_profile': <calibre.customize.profiles.InputProfile object at 0x039E9A90>,
'insert_blank_line': False,
'insert_metadata': False,
'isbn': None,
'keep_ligatures': False,
'language': None,
'level1_toc': None,
'level2_toc': None,
'level3_toc': None,
'line_height': 0.0,
'linearize_tables': False,
'margin_bottom': 5.0,
'margin_left': 5.0,
'margin_right': 5.0,
'margin_top': 5.0,
'max_toc_links': 50,
'no_chapters_in_toc': True,
'no_default_epub_cover': False,
'no_inline_navbars': False,
'no_svg_cover': False,
'output_profile': <calibre.customize.profiles.OutputProfile object at 0x039E9C70>,
'page_breaks_before': u'/',
'prefer_metadata_cover': False,
'preprocess_html': False,
'preserve_cover_aspect_ratio': False,
'pretty_print': True,
'pubdate': None,
'publisher': None,
'rating': None,
'read_metadata_from_opf': 'c:\\docume~1\\susans~1\\locals~1\\temp\\calibre_0 .7.1_9tsgul.opf',
'remove_first_image': False,
'remove_footer': False,
'remove_header': False,
'remove_paragraph_spacing': False,
'remove_paragraph_spacing_indent_size': 1.5,
'series': None,
'series_index': None,
'tags': None,
'timestamp': None,
'title': None,
'title_sort': None,
'toc_filter': None,
'toc_threshold': 6,
'use_auto_toc': False,
'verbose': 2}
InputFormatPlugin: RTF Input running
on E:\E-Books\EBook Library\Harry Potter Fanfiction\Abandoned (4304)\Abandoned - Harry Potter Fanfiction.rtf
Converting RTF to XML...
Preprocessing to convert unicode characters
line: 1 has bad encoding
File "preprocessed.rtf" does not appear to be RTF.
Python function terminated unexpectedly
'ascii' codec can't decode byte 0xe7 in position 490: ordinal not in range(128)Invalid RTF: File not ascii encoded.
(Error Code: 1)
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "site.py", line 103, in main
File "site.py", line 85, in run_entry_point
File "site-packages\calibre\utils\ipc\worker.py", line 99, in main
File "site-packages\calibre\gui2\convert\gui_conversion.py", line 24, in gui_convert
File "site-packages\calibre\ebooks\conversion\plumber.py", line 808, in run
File "site-packages\calibre\customize\conversion.py", line 211, in __call__
File "site-packages\calibre\ebooks\rtf\input.py", line 197, in convert
File "site-packages\calibre\ebooks\rtf\input.py", line 88, in generate_xml
File "site-packages\calibre\ebooks\rtf2xml\ParseRtf.py", line 238, in parse_rtf
calibre.ebooks.rtf2xml.ParseRtf.InvalidRtfExceptio n: 'ascii' codec can't decode byte 0xe7 in position 490: ordinal not in range(128)Invalid RTF: File not ascii encoded.

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It's complaining about the first line of the file, which is usually, but not always, a plain old carriage return. These were saved from Word 2003 in RTF format, so I have no idea what the problem could be. Happy to send files if necessary.

Needless to say, saving them all in another format without a batch processor is not going to happen.