1992 240sx, ticking noise after re-shimming KA24DE head

[slipnfall]

Hi folks, I have a rebuilt KA24DE, roughly 30k on it. I just recently got around to re-shimming the head... the machine shop that did my head didn't do a good job of returning the valve stems to their correct height. Anyways, they were all a little lose(some as bad as 17mil). So I went ahead and re-shimmed them all and now they are all withing spec. to the T.

As a *direct* result, I get this ticking noise now(almost like a timing chain tick(??)) above 3.5-4k. Only durring accelleration... if I back off the throttle it goes away. The odd thing it it's not always there, and doesn't seem to be replicable. It does seem worse in cold weather. Sometimes I can have the car warmed up sufficiently, I come off the highway, and it's there. Other times it won't be warmed up and I don't hear it. It's most noticable in 1-3rd, but I can sometimes hear it in 4th(never in 5th). It is loud enough to be heard over a 2.5" exhaust w/test pipe in the cabin. Oil is and has been Mobil1 0W40. The car was a lot noisier at idle before the re-shim, but this worried me more than that.

FWIW I re-checked my timing and idle after, and even reset the ECU.

Any thoughts??

Thanks,Jamie

[elwesso]

is it getting adequate oil pressure...? Does the KA24 have HLA's? I cant remember.. If they do you could maybe have some air buildup....