Choosing a Tie Color

Well I've been messing around with deciding on what method I'm going to use to prepare the hand laid ties for the railroad. Here are some of my experiments thus far.

White Wash = 1:1, white acrylic paint:water.

Rit Black = Rit Black Fabric dye, diluted heavily with water

Rit Brown = Rit "Dark Brown" Fabric dye, diluted heavily with water

Custom Weathering Solution = Maple acrylic stain, windshield wiper fluid, gray acrylic (covered in a 7/8n2 SE Lounge post by me last year).

The Experiments

1. The raw tie, un-modified
   
   
2. White Wash + Once over with Rit Black (This technique was popularized here by Pacific Coastair Line On30)
   
   
3. White Wash + Twice over with Rit Black
   
   
4. White Wash + Once over with Rit Black + Once over with Rit Brown
   
   
5. White Wash + Once over with Rit Black + Twice over with Rit Brown
   
   
6. Dipped in straight Rit Brown
   
   
7. Custom Weathering Solution
   
   
8. Custom Weathering Solution + Once over with Rit Brown

I was originally leaning very strong towards #2, and actually produced about 30-40 ties in this color. But after looking at them in bulk, I'm not sure if that's the color I want to go with.

I'm pondering weathering them to the "sun bleached" look of #2 as intended, then once laid doing a light mist of Testor's Light Earth to simulate the dusty environment they've been living in.