I like finishing a razor on the coticule off a 4k. I'm not trying to reduce wear so much as get an idea how long this stone will last at that rate. I use a DMT 600 to create a slurry and to lap the stone. But from these responses, it sounds like I shouldn't worry too much about wearing the stone down. It also sounds like I don't need to have a perfectly flat stone to work off off? I like that vacuum feeling when a flat blade gets sucked to a flat stone, that's one of the ways I use to know that I've removed one more variable. Ryan82, if you haven't lapped your stone in 3 years, is it still perfectly flat, or does it not matter to you? I mean I feel like I don't need a perfectly flat stone for a rolling x stroke on smiling blades, but on a straight edge, I feel like it's necessary, even with an x stroke.