Tony:
Classical alchemy is of special interest to me. I can tell you that purchasing individual components will not gain you anything monetarily, especially in terms of your "compounding" time when compared to just buying gilt or gilder's wax. These commercial products all dry hard. If not using it in time turns them hard, then simply dip your brush into ethanol and turn it into the hardened wax to soften it. The wax will apply just fine from your brush properly wetted, and then dries once again just as hard. There are similar commercial "iconistic" products out there in cake or tablet form anyway.
One can also use button-lac as a graining liquid, which is heavy in shellac wax. This is as fresh and as handy as it gets. However, use up those hardened gilder's waxes first, because now as solids they won't spill all over your
touch-up kit.
William Balsiger