Death on virgin smoke

I just bought a Green Mountain Pellet Pooper DB model. It was delivered Saturday about 5 pm, set up and started by the dealer.

I let it burn in to about 450 turn it off, open the hatch and aired it out. Then I spayed her down with Pam and brought fired up again to about 165 for a couple of hours of smoke on a nice pork butt I had ready to go. I then increased the temp to 185 for about three more hours then 220. The lower temps were to encourage more smoke.

It has a dandy remote with in that shows grill and internal meat temp. I didn't sleep much last night and checked the remote next to my bed frequently. Internal temp kept climbing and grill temp held rock solid. At about 5:15 am the internal temp was about 180 doing great. An hour and a half later the remote read grill temp 85 and internal meat temp 185. What?!

I went to the smoker and a loud constant alarm was on. I opened the pellet hopper and saw the auger exposed. Pellets were along the side of the box but had not fell through to the auger! I pushed pellets down and tried to restart it it but no luck.

I took my butt off the grill knowing it was not going to pull if under 200 degrees.

I vacuumed out the grill and burn pot and turned it back on. Still that alarm. It cycled but never burnt pellets. I unplugged it totally disgusted.

Does anybody own one of these damn things? I'm ready for a refund now!

Well the cook was over after it wouldn't restart. I vacuumed it out and primed the pot then turned it on again. The alarm still rung and it wouldn't burn again. Fark this. If it runs out of pellets (which it shouldn't since I filled it and still had a lot on each side of the auger) this is retarded design issue. They will get a rash tomorrow morning from me.

Plus they owe me a pork butt since I couldn't finish mine to 200 for a pull.

I heard good customer service but this is a stupid issue on a first smoke. Not happy at all.

Thanks for you comments guys. I have checked out pelletheads.com and heard good things about customer service but wouldn't expect to get bunged on the first smoke.

I've got a Kamado and a vertical too but really want any easier way to go. I work and travel a lot so when I'm home I have a low level for BS which is why I bought a pellet smoker (plus my wife can cook on it). Ugh.

Btw, I slept one hour and ten minutes at the longest stretch. I deserve some sleep. If you had my schedule (and I'm late fifties now) you might have a different aspect.

I'm no GD comp smoker. Some of us have to work to support the other 46% but that's not an issue for this post.

Please excuse my crotchety prose. Just urinated off with my grill

Pellet hopper was full and dealer delivered three new bags. Strange it would stick to the side but then again, the hopper is square not cylindrical conical which would seem the correct design. Perhaps the bigger issue is why it wouldn't just shut down. After cleaning out and re-priming the alarm continued and it didn't fire. It does seem to be the starter or igniter. Poor design issue.