Tormek T-4 knife sharpening question for beginner

[tgbto]

With regard to knife catching, if you doubled the angle as @cbwx34 mentioned, that would definitely increase the chances of the knife catching.

For what it's worth, it happened to me twice since I got the Tormek, and both times i was distracted and kind of released the pressure keeping the jig against the usb.

If I keep the jig stop pressed on the USB, I feel like I could increase the pressure of the knife to the stone like crazy and it still wouldn't catch. Not that you *should* do that though.

In more physical terms, when the knife is fixed and the wheel turning, this is dynamic friction, associated with a relatively low friction coefficient. If you release the pressure on the jig and let the knife move with the wheel, the relative speed decreases, the relative angle increases, and eventually something (the USB, your hand, ...) will try to stop the knife by suddently increasing the force in the axis of the jig handle. Enter the realm of static friction: the friction coefficient increases dramatically, the knife will be pulled much more forcefully by the wheel, the relative speed will decay and next thing you know you just dent your wheel and your edge.