[Healeys] retorquing cylinder head nuts

[Bob Haskell]

Listers,
When retorquing cylinder head, should one loosen the nut being retorqued first? Not completely loose, but I would think that a nut could be under torqued, but would take more than the spec torque to break it loose.

Cheers,

Bob Haskell
'60 AH3000 BT7 (big project)
'62 AH3000 BT7 (smaller project)
'64 Mini Cooper (small project - by definition)
'68 BMW 1600 (first car - project)
'80 MBG LE (running?)