[Steve2012]

Our dryer is about 5 years old and worked fine until a couple of months ago. It started taking 1-2 hours longer to dry clothes, then last week we began to smell natural gas intermittently and realized that the heat was intermittent as well. I thoroughly cleaned out the exhaust vent...it was horribly backed up, the previous owners of the home didn't put in exhaust vent correctly (about 40' of venting with six 90 degree turns!) so I re-routed the vent to a much shorter and more direct path. That improved airflow (obviously) but still same problem with intermittent heat and intermittent smell of natural gas in the drum and laundry room. Any suggestions? Could it be thermal fuse? Coils? Thanks in advance!