Shock absorber discussion

All,
I’m sure Shocks have been talked about quite a bit on here, but I’m looking for some for my personal setup.
I’m running a stock bodied ‘72 Demon, glass hood, stock interior, S/S springs moved inboard to the frame.
Building a small block/904, 4.30 gear w/good drag radials.
I know the day is gone when you ran old wore out shocks on the front and the long Chrysler Imperial shocks on the rear like when I first bought the car back in ‘83.
Everything has come a long way I’m finding out, and as always, I come here to the professionals.
I’m hoping to run 11.50’s and want to buy shocks once.
I’m leaning towards QA1’s or something in that price range???
As always, everyones advice is very much appreciated!

Wally.

Double adjustables, best you can afford, both ends. AFCO Big Gun valving on the rear at a minimum.

And you don't buy, install and forget. They have to be maintained.

The longer I fool with this stuff, the more important I see the shock being to the overall package.

That’s awesome advice.....if I understood everything thoroughly.
Could you explain double adjustable to single in easy to understand terms?
What is Afco Big Gun valving?
The more I look up, the more important I’m hearing shocks are, so I’m trying to learn all that I can.

Thank you!

Double adjustable means those shocks now have external valves that allow you to adjust the extension and compression individually, very good thing to have on a drag car
I had a set of single adjustable Strange Engineering on the rear of my old Duster with ladder bars, those work okay on decent tracks but not so good on excellent or poor tracks. I replaced them later with a set of Strange Engr, double adjustable, they where the cats butt
I have no idea what Big Gun valving is, sorry
I have a S/P car now that has a set of single adjustable, extension only Koni coil over front shocks(that have to taken apart to adjust off the car ) that I'm going to replace with a set of new double adjustable with the external valves from one of the better shock companies so I can adjust them at the track easily It does have the newer, better style of double externally adjustable coil over shocks on the rear

I think the Viking Double Adjustable shocks are a really good value. I have been happy with their rear shocks and I need to add the fronts. My car 60s low 1.4s and sometimes the front comes up too fast with the old lakewood 90/10s.

Badfish, what’s the rest of your combo?
I’d like to know if what I’m building is close so I can gauge off of it.

Cab, you’re always a wealth of knowledge and it’s much appreciated!
My Demon will be 75% track car running drag radials.
I suppose looking into the cost etc. does my car constitute the need for that expensive of a shock?
I won’t be a cheap a$$ by all means but will it be worth it.
Thanks again all.

Wally.

IIRC the AfCo "Big Gun" valving is a more aggressive window, extension wise for radial type tyres. I have them on mine. With Caltracs there was way too much hit for a bias ply and they would wad the tyres up pretty bad, so much we ran out of extension adjustment and had to compromise with tyre pressure. After switching to radials I got Menscer to re-valve all 4 corners. The Menscer fronts didn't seem to control the wheelstands and we ended up doing some damage to oil pans, headers etc At the beginning of this season we stumped up for Santhuffs for the front. The Santhuffs made a big difference and by the end of the season we had picked .06 in the 1/4. Buy the best you can afford and you wont have to replace when things "grow" so often. DAMHIK
Below is link to a typical pass
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4B_QewPIhc

I went 9.70's w/90-10 calverts in the ft and 5-ways in the rear along w/a best of 1.33 60 ft. but now I run Shilo's old rear Vikings and it's wheels up and planting hard now so double adj. in the ft. are now needed to control the wheelies.....

I've been happy with my ViKing Double Adjustable shocks too. I run a pretty wide range of surfaces and they seem to have enough range to work so far.

My car has a 416" W2 headed small block. It has been a best of 10.54@124.5. with a best ever 60ft of 1.41. It weights 3550 with driver. The chassis setup is RMS upper arms and strut rods with slant 6 bars and lakewood 90/10 shocks. The rear is calvert mono springs and cal tracks with double adjustable viking shocks. If the track is marginal it will hook then spin a little when the front suspension tops out, I think some DA front shocks could help slow that down a little.

I run a 28x10.5 Pro Bracket Radial.

COOL car !!!! love it