A quick follow up. Although first, is it okay to continue this here, or should I start my own thread? On one hand, I think it makes sense to have one thread with a lot of advice about using the abrasive buffs. On the other hand, this was really about C utz's restoration. Anyhow, as an experiment I took the other blade that I got off ebay - really grungy, but it's a Henckels #9 and I'm trying to restore up enough of them for a three day set - and started working on the back side of the tang.

First I cleaned it up as well as I could with MAAS, a surprising amount of crap came off, but there's still a good amount of minor pitting and scratching as expected. Second I hand sanded with 220 moving the length of the tang the whole time. Third I used the fine (320 - purple) buff spinning across the tang and ran that over one half of the tang. Thinking about what C utz said about the drill press I tried to simulate that a bit more by moving back and forth, slowly progressing along the tang, no more circles. I used only about as much pressure as was required to feel like I was actually making contact.

Now I have two abutting areas that are very easy to distinguish because the scratches are 90 degrees from each other. The 320 buff is definitely an improvement over the 220 hand sanding - as it should be. I think this technique, inspired by the drill press, worked much better. Although it still will take more work to completely eliminate all of the 220 scratches.

So the end result is that I believe I've proven to myself that I can use the buffs effectively and that they can replace hand sanding at least up to 320 grit. I think I will try and complete the entire tang on the Henckels using nothing lower than the coarsest buff, aka no flap wheel, and see what that looks like. I'm sure it will still have some damage left from its years in whatever hell rusted it like it this, but it will probably be good enough for now. Plus, the battle scarred look has some appeal. Chicks dig scars, right?