it's certainly not scratch free; the bevel is covered in fine scratches.
From this, I take it we can assume that you
do want a mirror polish? Just thought I'd check, since it wasn't really mentioned directly.
Anyhoo, why do you want a mirror polish if I may ask? While it will give a finer edge on minute scale, you'll probably find a lot more flaws just from hand sharpening if you look that closely. If the knife is of a good steel, hardened properly and has good geometry, I doubt you'll see a huge difference in cutting if you have a mirror polish, compared to, say, 600 or 800 grit, unless it's a fine woodcarving knife or you're using it to operate on people. It can, of course, look lovely depending on the rest of the blade (I think that mirror polished convex bevels look great on forge finished knives) and if it's aesthetic, then don't bother reading on, as I can't advise you on how to get a mirror polish, only having bothered once, and quickly abandoning it when I realised that if I wanted to do it every time I sharpen my knives I wouldn't have any free time to use them
The longest I ever sharpen a knife for is about half an hour - usually, though, it's closer to about five seconds
I use a Mora with a primary bevel angle of about 16-17°, and a microbevel of about 35° (just guessing).
Most of the time, my sharpening consists of two swipes on either side of the blade, using a piece of wet-or-dry (600 grit, though it's worn down quite a bit) sitting on a mousemat to give a very slight convex, sharpening only the secondary bevel.
When the bevel gets too wide or too thick, I spend a few minutes on a coarse diamond sharpener (100-and-something grit IIRC) glued to a bit of wood (it had a plastic backing which peeled away), followed by a few minutes on the fine side of a stone I picked up for £1.50 which I soak in water while using the diamond sharpener. I sometimes remove all the scratches from the diamond sharpener, but not generally, I don't find they make a great difference, it's just to give a generally smoother feel. For reference, the soaked stone gives a finish akin to something between 600 and 800 grit sandpaper. It's absolute rubbish when used dry. After using the stone, a couple strokes on the sandpaper again and that does me.
I do think that it makes a noticeable difference in efficieny when comparing, say, 120 grit to 600. But it seems the difference becomes logarithmically less noticeable as you go up the grits - to me, at least. I'm not trying to criticise, or to come off like I think I'm the last word in knife sharpening - but if you're only trying to get a mirror polish because you think that's how it "should" look, or because you think you'll get a massive difference in efficiency, I really wouldn't bother.
All the best, and best of luck getting the finish that suits you! Hope this helped somewhat
Pete
