I’m Utterly Confuzzled

I hardly ever ask questions/seek advice or imput...but this seems like a good time to do such a thing.
So as some of you know, I have recently started smoking tangiers again after about 8 months not smoking it, well... I decided to bone up on packing and heat management, and was also going off of memory, my first journey back into the tangiers world was with Noir Dark Plum...here's where my troubles started. For the past week when i put on the second round of coals it's harsh as hell, I'm using a small tang phunnel ( the same one I've always used) and 1 and a half coconaras cut into halves. I hadn't run into this issue before, and I'm really puzzled as to where I'm going wrong...but wait, there's more! So i decided to try a different flavor, noir m. Cherry, packed it like i always do, same set up, same amount of heat, and with this flavor it's just fine on the second round of coals... So I'm left to wonder if I was doing something wrong, or if maybe its the particular flavor I was smoking. Any advice folks.