Back in early 2000, when I first started working with mixed-metal hydroxide, very few drillers had ever heard this type of fluid and even fewer had ever seen it used.
While MMH has been used sparingly in the oilfield since about 1992, a whole host of issues prevented its wider acceptance for shallow aqueous jobs. Foremost of these was the fact that a mixed-metal fluid looks rather strange and overly thick. There has been more than one occasion where a well-meaning mud man ruined a beautiful MMH fluid by dosing it with dispersant.