Your Saab cylinder head story reminds me of a Jaguar story. Totally unrelated to getting things apart, but still, one of "those" moments for the guy.
He's got his inline-6 head off and down to the machine shop. Putting it back on however, he neglected to notice the armored control cable (probably throttle or heater control valve) sandwiched between the aluminum head and the block!

When I saw it (back at the machine shop) there was a nicely imprinted reverse-image of said cable in the head! Bummer in the summer for sure, for that guy.

Sorry for the hijacked subject matter. But when you said "cylinder head" my mind went right back to that little bit of drama.

Paul