Doctor Ben's Weathering Solution Spotlight: Instant Age #1152 Ready-To-Use Weathering Solution for Wood, Plastic, Hydrocal©, Metal & Much More-4oz Jar & 8oz, too! When I first began building Fine Scale Miniatures kits (manufactured by George Sellios) many years ago, the part that I enjoyed the most was the weathering. Nothing irked me more than to build a model in a brand new, pristine condition. I began looking for something more that what the FSM instructions offered. Don't get me wrong, I owe a great deal of what I learned about building models from building early Thomas A. Yorke kits, Model Masterpieces kits, Builders in Scale kits, Timberline kits; heck, there's even a thing or two to learn from building the Campbell kits.
In my quest for the ultimate weathering process I remember that back in the 1980s India Ink and Alcohol were all the rave thanks to a number of popular modelers. And if not careful, it was very easy to "over" apply the mixture resulting in a dark, goth look when viewed under normal lighting covered up much of the model's detail.
The Doctor Ben's Instant Age takes the original technique one step further with the inclusion of a Doctor Ben's Weathering Pigment. NOTE: Using another dry product to add to the India Ink technique may not work as well as using the Doctor Ben's because of quality and fillers in the other pro duct. My addition of the Doctor Ben's Weathering Pigment to the Instant Age Weathering Solution results in significant improvement creating a more dimensional look instead of just the India Ink laying on the surface of the model. But there are a couple of notes when using Instant Age. Originally, we packaged Instant Age as a "Ready-to-Use" produ ct and customers complained it was too thin or diluted. Today's Instant Age is twice a strong as the original which allows the modeler more flexibility in the level of coverage when applying Instant Age. There is very light by simply slightly mixing the Instant age and dipping the brush tip in the very top of the Weathering Solution, or the other extreme is shake the heck out of the jar (lid tightly screwed on) and you've got really dark. I prefer to apply several light coats being sure to wait till each coat is dry and if I'm in a hurry, a hair dryer or heat gun with dry the Instant Age real quick.Much more detail is discussed in our Doctor Ben's How-To #1: Turning Toys into Models booklet and in our Blog Archive June 2015. More Here! | 
