I've been working on my honing skills the last few months, and have determined that my Norton 4k/8k is not as flat as it should be. I determined this by putting very little water on the hone and placing it against a piece of 1/4 inch glass. If you have too much water on the hone or the glass, it will look like the whole hone is in contact, when it's really not. I eventually bought the Norton stone flattener for $25, and that helps, but it wears the stone quickly!

My technique is the following:
1. put lines on stone with pencil and work out on Norton flattening stone.
2. go to sandpaper on 1/4 inch glass with 300 grit smoothing
3. sandpaper on 1/4 inch glass with 400 grit
4. finish it with 1200 grit by hand, very gently (also using this to work up a slurry for honing)

I'm not claiming that my technique works well, but rather
I'd really like to hear how the pros on this site do it...

Thanks,
E