A Home-Made Power Supply that Lasts 1000 Years?

x_man asks: "This may sound a little strange but I've accumulated a lot of cool stuff throughout my life. Add to that my parent's stuff, my wife's stuff, and all of the other cool stuff I plan to accumulate before I die, and you have a lot of stuff. The problem is what to do with all of this stuff when I die. My descendants will want a few bits, but I can't bear the thought of my 1000+ collection of sci-fi books being scattered to the Goodwill winds. Therefore, I've decided to entomb my stuff. It will all go into an airtight stainless steel shipping container and be buried on a family plot for a 1000 years or so. I will have the ultimate geek time capsule, but there is one problem. Let's say you want to broadcast some sort of locator beacon in a 1000 years. How do you construct a reliable power supply that will last at least 1000 years or more? There's also the question of how to signal future generations. I'm thinking some sort of VLF for ground penetration."

Comments

Two words

[fiori]

Nuclear.

Re:Two words

[u-238]

He meant three: New Kya Ler

Use one of those batteries

[mysidia]

The kind the pink bunny uses that "keep going and going and going." ...

Thing is ..

[torpor]

.. how do you make one yourself?

"MAKE Magazine: the Radio-Isotopic Generator Issue" .. yeah, wake me up for that one.

Simple Solution

[stinkydog]

The radio issue is what will kill you. In a thousand years, our descendents will communicate with mind waves. Take two largish chunks of plutonium and separate them with a membrane that will last 1000 years. Once the membrane fails, the resulting explosion should be hard to miss.

SD

Eek and Me Capsu

[tavilach]

Timmy: [Reads] "I am _ _eek, and this is __ __me capsu__"...
Mom: What do you have there, little Timmy?
Timmy: I don't know, mommy. What does this mean?
Mom: He was Eek, and this is Me Capsu. Oh my goodness, little Timmy...you've found the remains of an ancient king, Eek, and his wife, Me Capsu!