You can drive to my house and pick up my Traeger XL for a good price

You can drive to my house and pick up my Traeger XL for a good price

LOL, If I catered or did a lot of parties, I might take you up on that. I really think the new models have a lot of promise though. I like their WiFi and the temps seem to hold very steady even though they are off.

My whole intent with this thread is just to share what I’m finding. I hope they fix the issue before I give up and I should be happy. I’ve learned a lot the last few years trying lots of grills and figured out I’m probably best with two pellet grills even though I don’t use them enough to really justify it. At his time of my life, I tend to be able to slow cook 2-3 times a month and usually want to throw several things on to eat some now and save some for later. Mixing the temps, all the grease, etc. doesn’t work well on one pit. I could probably supplement that with charcoal, but I’m not wanting to spend that much time tending to it.

BTW, If you try hard, you can fit four shoulders on the 575.

Thank you for your input, I appreciate it. It is always nice to hear peoples thoughts on why or why not they chose a product.

I can understand the need for more than one pit considering I have 5 and am looking at buying a 6th.  I would like to get to 4, but may stay with 5 if I can't find one that does wings as good as one I would like to get rid of.

Even the folks touting a Memphis (or other) as a single solution appliance .. they sous vide or instant pot or blackstone griddle etc etc etc.

Capacity, different temperatures, different dishes are all good reasons to have more than one pit/appliance. 

DK

I wouldn't actually call myself a Traeger 'hater',   I own three Traegers.  But then , other then the actual joy I've had to be able to cook with pellets on my first pellet grill, the Traeger Junior,  I can't really say much good about them. Well, that's not entirely true... I've never had hard fast failures, even after basically severely neglecting mine and then turning them on to figure out they still actually work.

   The bad is, I've never had a Traeger that I really love...  The temperature holding ability is really bad on all three I own.   Yeah, I can cook on all three of them, but not nearly as confident in any of the three as I am with my Fast Eddy, or even with the Rec Tec Stampede I own. 

  To see that Traeger switched to a new style controller had me very optimistic that they could put most of their temperature control issues to bed...   But based on this report, I would say they apparently missed their chance to actually get things right.   Maybe your's is a one off issue, but I somehow doubt it.

 Traeger is how I got started cooking with pellets. Having to learning it's idiosyncrasies taught me a lot. Was I grateful for the learning curve? Yes.. Knowing what I know now would I do it again (Traeger)?

 No..

 Those were the earlier days of pellet grills. To day the advancements have lead to more controllable, long lasting, better finishes and more user friendly pits..Premium brands have proven this adding

 longevity to the mix as well as some extra features.." You have come a long way baby ".

  To see that Traeger switched to a new style controller had me very optimistic that they could put most of their temperature control issues to bed...   But based on this report, I would say they apparently missed their chance to actually get things right.   Maybe your's is a one off issue, but I somehow doubt it.

Actually, the new controller seems to hold a temp very nice, it's just not the temp you think it is at higher settings. You're right about it not being a one off. It's very widespread on the new Pro models, but the new Ironwood and Timberline don't seem to have the problems. Maybe they are using a different RTD on the Pros with different resistance or something (maybe their supplier isn't producing the right specs either). I'm sure they'll get it figured out and I'll report more after they do if I have the patience to wait. I bought it from a store with the old Sears like 'Your Satisfaction is Guaranteed' return policy just in case I found something like this. I haven't done much with it lately as I've been focused on my son's graduation and final season of soccer, haven't even kept up with the owner's group to see if anyone else has updates on the issue. Last I heard was they were acknowledging a Pro model problem and had instructed customer service to quit throwing parts at the problem until they've come up with a good fix. As well, man people have wrapped the RTD in aluminum foil and have gotten much closer on high temps. I haven't tried this myself, but haven't fired it up in 3-4 weeks either.

Other pellet grills manufacturers have changed part designs repeatedly and had numerous firmware updates trying to fix problems. This isn't unique to Traeger. At one time GMG even had a cold weather firmware and a warm weather version.

Three months in and still no update for the temperature problem and it still seems pretty widespread. I talked to the dealer I purchased from and they are willing to take it back, so I will probably return it as I'm afraid if I wait too much longer they will no longer accept it. Watching the Traeger forum and Facebook groups the problems seem pretty widespread and people claim to be fed all kinds of strange information from Traeger support like how the grill somehow reads from 3 spots inside the cooking chamber (with a single RTD) and averages them, so any comparison using other thermometers cannot be accurate as well as everyone being told this is the first Traeger has heard of the issue when they call. I understand that there's a delicate balance between when to pull or hold a product, publicly admitting a bug, and just pretending it doesn't exist. However, it cannot be good for your reputation to tell customers they are stupid and say there's no problems with their product.

Three months in and still no update for the temperature problem and it still seems pretty widespread. I talked to the dealer I purchased from and they are willing to take it back, so I will probably return it as I'm afraid if I wait too much longer they will no longer accept it. Watching the Traeger forum and Facebook groups the problems seem pretty widespread and people claim to be fed all kinds of strange information from Traeger support like how the grill somehow reads from 3 spots inside the cooking chamber (with a single RTD) and averages them, so any comparison using other thermometers cannot be accurate as well as everyone being told this is the first Traeger has heard of the issue when they call. I understand that there's a delicate balance between when to pull or hold a product, publicly admitting a bug, and just pretending it doesn't exist. However, it cannot be good for your reputation to tell customers they are stupid and say there's no problems with their product.

I think most Traeger users have no clue that this may or may not be a problem.  You have quite a bit of experience compared to most users is my guess.  If you are unhappy and have an opportunity to return it, I would too.

I remember when I first saw swings with my Traeger XL probably 8 years ago or so (maybe 10).  The dealer came out and wasn't much help.  Traeger sent a new controller and I kept the one that was replacement.  After many years of experience on these forums, I am not sure there is any problem with the original controller.  I think it is just the way the controller/grill functioned.  I didn't know any better and apparently Traeger tech support doesn't either.  It was easier (maybe or maybe not cheaper) for them to just send me a new controller.

Thanks Bar-B-Lew, what's funny is satisfaction really isn't the core issue, I actually like the grill. If I was even 90% certain that they'd get the temp issue fixed, I'd keep it. The grill just flat out lies to you at higher temps. I'm not sure I even need it to get to 450, but I feel like products should perform as advertised, especially from a company that is marketing centric and selling imported products at premium prices. What I'm most scared of is a real problem that makes the grill non-function and not being able to get support to get it fixed.

I returned this last night. I still liked the grill, but with no resolution in sight, I didn’t feel I could wait indefinitely to see IF they fixed it. Then today someone posted on the Traeger owners forum today that they are pushing an update over next few days and he got a support manager to send it to his grill fixing the problem, good grief.

I returned this last night. I still liked the grill, but with no resolution in sight, I didn’t feel I could wait indefinitely to see IF they fixed it. Then today someone posted on the Traeger owners forum today that they are pushing an update over next few days and he got a support manager to send it to his grill fixing the problem, good grief.

Welp, ya can always buy it again, maybe from some place else!