Z probing with G38.4

I currently use a z probe routine that uses G38.2 to lower the tool into a metal puck until detecting continuity. This works 90% of the time, but there have been a few times this went wrong when either the wire to the puck had become damaged from use over time or the endmill had some plastic stuck to the tip or some resin from a wood cut, etc.

It seems much safer to manually drive the endmill down into the puck, then use G38.4 in the probe routine to move away from the puck. When I make this change and manually drive the endmill into the puck, I get a "Probe tripped during coordinate jog" error. Any ideas on how to avoid this error or how G38.4 is typically implemented?

Thanks!

Looking at this table in the manual, G38.4 seems not possible without probing move towards piece.

 

I'm not sure what makes you say that. The table you posted shows that 38.2 probes toward the piece and 38.4 probes away from the piece.

Also, I've implemented this enough that I can get it to sometimes work (~1 in 10 tries) because the "Probe tripped" error that I mentioned doesn't always occur.

To give an answer, i just tested on my machine. I think the probe tripped error is momentary, to avoid a bad crash, and stop movement. Just cancel and ignore that message and continue.
On my machine it worked to release from toolsetter while probe tripped

G91 G38.4 Z2 F50
G0 G90 G53 Z0