You were correct, it wasn't quite activating the switch. I've adjusted that and have a new problem. The Chameleon doesn't push the filament hard enough to overcome the tension in the extruder. There's no way to adjust the spring tension, which on one hand seems like a poor design decision from Creality, but on the other hand in the 3 years I've had the printer I've never had a tension problem when it's being used as designed. In any event, it's what I have so it's what we need to get working.
I tried using some super thin support scraps at the X to shim it and push the spring lever in to ease the tension, but couldn't get it in the goldilocks zone. It either pushed the filament in but then the extruder didn't grip it tight enough, or didn't go in at all.
If you have any suggestions I'm all ears, otherwise I guess I'll try to modify that part to give less tension when I have some time on the weekend.
Still don't know why it wants to pause but I'm not ready to cross that bridge yet. We'll figure that out once the mechanical operation is working.