Do I Need 2 Synergy Reef Shadow Overflow?

[Ben Pedersen]

I’m in the process of setting up a 450 gallon reef tank. The tank will be configured as a peninsula. The Synergy Reef documentation says a single shadow overflow is rated up to 400 gallons.

Should I get a second Shadow overflow? My return pumps are a Vectra L2 and a second Vectra M2 for UV and other water treatment (as needed). I will be running the return water through the a sump with protein skimmer and large reefugium.

 

[slythy]

It seems as many people have good experiences with the Synergy Reef Shadow as have bad.

Thats common for all popular products. You will normally hear 4x the bad as you do the good.

What did you end up going with?

I have a modular marine on my 70 and a tideline (planet aquariums) on my 180 and have been very happy with both. . Modular marine also come in much larger sizes.

 

[Ben Pedersen]

Thats common for all popular products. You will normally hear 4x the bad as you do the good.

What did you end up going with?

I have a modular marine on my 70 and a tideline (planet aquariums) on my 180 and have been very happy with both. . Modular marine also come in much larger sizes.

I’m going to go with a single Synergy Reef shadow. I had already purchased it and really just wanted to know if I needed 2 for my new tank. The tank will be around 450 gallons.

 

[slythy]

I’m going to go with a single Synergy Reef shadow. I had already purchased it and really just wanted to know if I needed 2 for my new tank. The tank will be around 450 gallons.

Good call.

I had the dual overflows on my first 180 and it was a PITA to get the flow right. I had to adjust it every couple days. If you can avoid it then its for the best.

 

[poloqr]

Hi! How did that go? Any good the synergy reef?

 

[UncommonSense]

Hi! How did that go? Any good the synergy reef?

No.

As mentioned by other; they are quite loud and difficult to tune… (I’m running mine at ~750gph [observed, after head loss])

They are thin injection molded material, the V1, and V2 I have experience with cracked in multiple places as soon as they were plumbed with rigid PVC… ostensibly the fiber reinforced plastic of the V3 fixes this issue, but I’m still skeptical…

Additionally, and most egregiously:

— the removable weir.

— a novel idea, but it means that there’s a seam more than an inch underwater when the system is operating…

— this means that your system will drain additional water beyond the bottom of the weir teeth in a power outage; to the tune of 6-ish gallons on my 180g…

 

[slythy]

Mine has a removable weir like that on my planet aquariums. While it does drain lower just plan accordingly with sump size.

I will say ai do like my modular marine overflow the best though. They also can do very large ones.