Valves on new rebuild, When to re-adjust Options

[jeffdon]

Been driving with the new engine, and probably have all of an hour and a half behind the wheel. The engine has quite the clattering noise that I notice at idle, which I assume is the valves. I set (and re-set) them three times before it went in the car. My webcam 494 spec card showed to set both valves to .006. I went with .007, based on the common thinking that its better to be a little loose. I am running stock push rods.

Just climbed under the car thinking to check the valves, and am really not looking forward to this. I have set them with the engine in the car in the past, and cannot recall it being such a crappy job.

I guess my question boils down to this:

Should I put more road time on the car before adjusting the valves? Or am I better off letting things break in more before doing the adjust. I am thinking if the valves are making noise, they may be loose, which is way better than too tight, allthough the performance would be down.

Whats all ya'lls consensus?