photo from ADAMANT, used w/o permissions–permission pending
Happy New Year, Gentle Readers! The first henge of the year is one that will be hard to top. It’s made of stents of the sort used to prop open coronary arteries. The copy accompanying it reads:
“A reader reports one of his dearly departed co-workers spent a great deal of time creating a scale model in stents of Stone Henge. Stent Henge was created with pieces of scrap Nitinol self expanding vascular stents embedded in cured Sylgard 184 elastomer. It is a nearly perfect reproduction of the layout of the famous stone circle in England in a compact package just about the perfect size for a paper weight. It took nearly a year of work during slow periods. ” [links added by us]
We wonder, how do you even do something like this over a year? Do you add the clear silicone slowly, layer by layer? We don’t know, but the outcome is impressive and accurate. See the section that has retained its lintels? And the inner trilithon horseshoe?
Whoever made this used a photo of Stonehenge as it stands today as a guide. Perhaps he kept it in his chamber–or maybe he knew it by heart! I suppose we shouldn’t go on in that vein. (Don’t beat us!) Heh. Our New Year’s resolution is to actually be funny. Wish us luck!
Score: 7½druids. It’s made of unusual materials, and someone has taken pains to make it accurate. That’s what we like here in Clonehenge country. Posthumous kudos to the builder of this eccentric beauty!
CLONEHENGE 
Welcome back to life, Mark! 😉 What a brilliant henge to be remembered by!
BTW,
It did take over a year to make. I used an aerial photo I got off the web as a reference. The stents were scrap from a previous project I had been on. The small amounts of Sil-Guard was extra from making stent deployment models. Several tries and size perspectives were tried. The mold was a plastic hockey puck holder turned upside down. The lid is used as the base for the stent henge.
And yes I am alive. The reason Jens stated that I was “dearly departed” was because I was layed off from the company. Who knew this thing would end up on the web>
Mark
Mark, we would love to see more pictures of it! This is a standout among the thousands of henges we have seen. We thank you!
I made stent henge when working at a medical device company in 2009. It is made from sections of non-electropolishesd Nitinol stent sections encased in 8 separate layers of Sil-Guard silicone potting material. I have other photos, and I still have the henge.
Mark
Wow.
Making that henge looks like it was quite a difficult stent!
I wonder if the elastomer will last more than the real henge?
This fine Clonehenge deserves our Heart felt appreciation.