specifics in Spear fighting combat

[Paullus Scipio]

Giannis wrote:-

before the final charge,the phalanx was doubling its thickness by halfing its depth and keeping its lenght the same. Usually there was considerable time for both phalanxes to do so.

This is correct, the length of line stayed the same throughout....if a phalanx formed up in open order ,with ,say, files of 12 deep and 6,000 strong with 6 ft per man, they would have a frontage 1000 yards long. To form close order the rear half of the files marches forward into the intervals, leaving them in close order, 6 deep, still on a 1000 yard front.
The mistake here is to think in terms of modern, or Roman, drill which was based on ranks. Greek/Macedonian drill was based on files...

I never said they would switch to close order only about 100 m from the enemy.

....but they would have formed close order at around this distance, and not much before, if an advance/charge were intended.
Christian wrote:-

My memory is that Athenian ephebe training was only instituted in the late 4th century, as I noted in my post. Is there any other source that speaks to hoplite training earlier?

Yes, Xenophon mostly, but also Thucydides, Plato's Laches and many other sources refer to Hoplite training ( or rather, lack of it ! ) so we have a fairly good picture of what Hoplites could and couldn't do....
Prior to the ephebic reform (reform in recruitment) at Athens in 335 BC, Athenian hoplites were generally expected to provide their own arms and armour, and responsible for their own training ( see for example, the discussion in Plato's Laches, where the pros and cons of professional teachers of Hoplomachia = hoplite fighting, are discussed.).
While their defeat at Macedonian hands at Chaeironea in 338 caused the Athenians to rethink how to assure their military preparedness, little was done until Alexander the Great departed for the Near East in the spring of 335. The resulting ephebic reform involved a massive increase in the city's hoplite forces, with the thetes, the poor of Athens, admitted to the hoplite ranks for the first time. The need to equip the thetes(lower class citizens) as hoplites resulted in the likely adoption of a system of issue-and-return, which was the most economical one available. Each of the ephebes, the new recruits to the system, was given a shield and spear at state expense, trained for a year and was then sent on garrison duty for a year.