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Originally Posted by Green
I've voiced in this forum several times that the westerners are wont to 'over clean' the blades into shiny surface, whereas most locals (at least in Malaysia) prefer to leave the blade in the original texture which is usually somewhat grainy almost like v fine sandpaper texture. Hence the usual mode of aggresive cleaning is merely using hard tootbrush after a long dip in coconut juice or merely clean it with lime juice with hard rub with thumb and finger? (that's how i saw Bugis people clean their keris anyway).
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Yes Green, you have voiced this opinion on numerous occasions and each time we have discussed that methods for keris cleaning are different in different parts of Indonesia. I am get just a little tired on you blaming what you see as "over cleaning" on Western preferences. Alan's suggestions have nothing to do with Western ideas on this. How Bugis clean their blades and how Javanese clean their blades are simple not the same process. The Balinese are likely to actually polish their blades in the cleaning process. Like Detlef i have also seen many Peninsula and Bugis blades that have never left Indonesia that have been maintained with very smooth finishes. As for you own keris panjang i cannot really see the abrasions you speak of in the photographs provided, but an old blade is bound to have obvious wear on the high points and edges.
You should also understand, in case you are unaware, that steel wool comes in many different grades of coarseness up to, i believe #0000. At that fine level it won't even scratch stainless steel. Alan probably should have stated what grade of steel wool he was talking about, but i would image he probably would suggest something around #00, which is still too fine to do any damage unless you were really using some excessive force when working.