Smoke Fire temperature issue

[SmokeFire_Guest]

My SF worked brilliantly for the first season. The second season I tried to do a smoke and after an hour or so I noticed the temperature was dropping. I assumed either pellet flow or burner rod to be the problem. After removing all the pellets and a thorough cleaning i putr everythiung back together and the same problem recurred. Thhe pellets flow into the burn box as. the should and the burner rod gets the fire going like it should and everything works as it should for perhaps an hour and then burn rod goes out and the temperature drops. With out touching a thing, I can restart cold and the unit fires up but repeats the problem. It is acting more like a software problem than a hardware one. Is there anyone in the Tucson area qualified to work on these units?

 

[Goneincognito]

It's not the glow plug.
They only operate for a few minutes when you first start it.

My first thought would be a pellet void (do you still have the finger guard in?).
I will assume that when you cleaned it, you also inspected everything for damage and all was ok?

Since you are leaning towards a possible software issue, have you confirmed the software and firmware are up to date as well as done a reset on the controller?

 

[Lord of Smoke]

Did your thorough cleaning include pulling the auger and cleaning it? I was not sieving my pellets and the dust compressed on the back of the auger making it difficult for pellets to drop down,