You're likely running into issues because the forum's search page uses dynamic content loading or server-side protections that make scraping more complex.
A few things to try:
Check if the content is loaded via JavaScript – If so, Scrapy alone won’t see it. You might need to use Splash (for rendering JS in Scrapy) or tools like Playwright/Selenium instead.
Session or headers required – The server may require specific headers (like Referer, User-Agent, Cookies, etc.) to return results. Use browser dev tools (F12) > Network tab to inspect what's being sent during a normal search and replicate those headers in your Scrapy request.
Rate-limiting or bot detection – Frequent or unauthenticated requests can trigger temporary bans or timeouts. Try slowing down your crawl (using DOWNLOAD_DELAY, AUTOTHROTTLE_ENABLED) and setting realistic headers.
Try using a real browser to inspect redirects or session IDs – It’s possible your first search loads a temporary session or token you need to persist.
Let us know what you find in the response headers or logs — happy to dig deeper!