Hey guys, I'm a self taught sharpener. I've done LOTS of reading but don't have too many hours actually sharpening. I just bought a new plane and was flattening the back of the iron on Shapton ceramics 1k,5k,8k.

on the 5k things got weird. The blade would ride across the surface like its on a cushion of air, which I'm assuming is stiction right? I tried a drop of dish soap in my spray bottle and it didn't help. If the stone is not making a nice swish-swish sound, does that mean it's not cutting at all?

i ended up having to go really slow, and apply lots of downward pressure to avoid the iron chattering along the stone.

i read about using short strokes across the width of the stone, but even those got pretty sticky. It would work ok for 10 seconds then the iron would just freeze up on the stone.

last point, the stones are just resting in the plastic case they came in, I haven't rigged up a stone holder yet, maybe that's the missing piece?

any other advice?