Help Lighting a IM Fusion 40

[Dgramig]

I am in the planning stage of building a reef aquarium. I finally decided on a IM 40 gallon aquarium. I have been in and out of saltwater aquariums since 2012. I recently been with out one for about 1-2 years. Looking for suggestions for a good light. It will be going for a mix reef mainly softies and LPS. I am sure i might have a SPS or 2 but not my main goal.
Looking for
-ease of use ( dont want to have to buy extra equipment to controll it)
-Support Softies and LPS
- mount from an arm coming off the back of the tank
-would prefer to have 1 light but if 2 is needed i will do that.

Right now i been looking at AI, Radion, and kessel just not sure what would work best for me the aquarium and my wallet.

Thanks
David

 

[ghostman]

Welcome David!!!! I had a IM40 for a while, and it is a great tank. I lit mine with AI Hydra26HD, and loved the look. I think 1 light is perfect for the size, controllable with WiFi, and there are lots of mounting options. But my FAVORITE lighting is Orphek for many reasons, but they tend to run a bit more money, and used ones are harder to come by.

 

[Richard Newman]

Hi dgramig, welcome!
I have the IM 40 and love it. I am currently using a single AI Prime HD with the bendable mounting arm. The light is current about 10" or so above the water line. The app is great and while I don't have a lot in the tank everything is doing very well. The Prime HD allows you to overdrive some of the channels if you don't need 100% in others. A nice feature. Below is the profile I've been using. It's roughly based on the AB+ schedule, but modified to enhance what's in my tank.

Best of luck!

 

[Dgramig]

Thank you for the quick responses. What about light bleeding into the room. As we all know all lights do it some worse than others.

 

[Buccal]

+1 for the AI Prime HD. I have one with the premium mount. Just about to get a second though as I have a IM 30L and it won’t quite cover the width.

 

[ghostman]

Thank you for the quick responses. What about light bleeding into the room. As we all know all lights do it some worse than others.

The Hydras will light up a room, but I don't they're as bad as the new Radions though. There are diffusers and boxes for both sets of lights that can block the light spill.

 

[Richard Newman]

Yeah, that happens depending on the time of the day and what lights are on. Our tank is in between our kitchen and family room and also surrounded by sliders. Lots of natural light gets in depending on the weather, but due to how our house is situated there is no direct sun light. Early on this could cause algae growth, but that's going to happen in any new tank. The biggest problem I have at the moment is diatoms in the sand due to low nutrients. Our tank is still an infant at just over 4 months old so it is still getting itself established. I recently added the IM Midsize DC protein skimmer and inTank media baskets and a fuge basket. I found a great 10$ water proof led light to light the fuge. My goal is to keep a colony of copepods. I bought some caulerpa macro algae from my LFS and copepods and phyto from the Algaebarn. So far as long as my urchin doesn't knock the corals down everything is thriving. I think my copepod colony is doing well as when I check the caulerpa growth I get a bunch of copepods in the main tank. Of course the fish love it.

Currently we have in the tank:
2 clowns
1 firefish
1 gramma
1 watchman goby
1 urchin
8 turbo snails (2 are zebra turbos)
6 blue legged hermits
a bunch of baby snails (came with either the live rocks or live sand )
1 green bubble tip anemone
1 green star polyp
1 pulsating Xenia (it was recently moved from the frag plug to a small rock and the urchin grazed right over it and knocked the heads off...ugh got them re-glued and so far so good)
1 zoa
1 duncan
1 acan
1 candy cane

You can't really go wrong with any of your light choices. For a mostly softy and LPS tank (which is what we're after) just about any light will be sufficient.

One of my biggest questions at the moment is whether I have enough flow or not. Currently I am only running the stock return pump. I do get wavyness in my corals and BTA, but it isn't much. I'll probably look at adding something later.

Best of luck!