I have never had this issue before. I have new AMC heads and new EMW 96mm clyinders. I assembled the longblock to check valve train geometry. I need to send my heads off to get the valve guide bosses cut however I cannot remove the jugs from the heads. I do not want to break any fins so I haven't tried much other than muscle.

Any ideas?

Heat. Torch the interface where the heads meet the barrels and they should come out. Do one at a time, the second one should come out easier. Tight fit

Uh, something is seriously wrong. I think amc heads are 1.7 bus castings that were modified for the 2 litre. You might have to open up the registers for the 96mm cylinders to fit into.Might try air pressure thru the plug holes to pop them loose.

Air pressure against what? There is nothing but open barrel there

Ha ha. You are absolutely right. Duh! Need coffee!!!
Wake up dumbass.

These heads are setup for 96mm jugs. The strange thing is that prior to putting the engine together, I put one of the jugs in the head to make sure it fit properly. There was a very precise fit, I did not difficulty putting the jug into the head without any major force.

I think that there is just a super precise fit. I will try to heating them a bit later today.

rubber mallet and some well placed taps (dont be shy) on the bottom of the cylinder all the way around.
Its only in the head less than a 1/4 if an inch...you just need to get it moving.

I would send along the heads and one cylinder to the shop, those are too tight and could create a problem once heated up by the motor.

Rich

In that case, I would rubber mallet them into the head as they are likely cocked just a little. This ought to free them up. Then heat, beat, repeat. I would not use a tap. Heat should give you the clearance you need and a rubber mallet is the persuasion. Always hit the cylinder parallel to the fins (duh).

This is not an interference fit. You hace an issue that you muat remedy.
Either the cylinder OD is too large or the head register ID is too small.
Or both.

Using a scalpel with a #22 blade, make an incision starting above the left jug and continue to the outer edge of the right jug. Then cut inferiorly until the bottom of the jug is reached then medially, and complete the cut on the other side in the same manner. Reflect the tissue while cutting away the remaining connected tissues before trying to pull the jugs off.

Wrong jugs

Hah- first time I used a 22 blade on a jug, green gel poured out. I was somewhat surprised but we quickly found that the cadaver had a mastectomy with silicone implant reconstruction. Not sure why the silicone turned green.

I have to send the heads off to get the valve guide bosses trimmed for dual springs so i'll just send in the cylinders with the heads and have them fix the issue.

This is one of my many problems that shouldn't be to hard to rectify.

Worked well however what a pain in the a$$. Will get this fixed soon so I don't have that issue again.

This could be traced to sagging case spigots. The cylinders are tilting and when the head was torqued down it wedged the leaning cylinder into the head registers.

I have observed the spigot sag as well as variations in the bore centers of cases and heads by as much as .005" in both directions.
If you are using 1.7 amc heads that have been bored for 96 cylinders and they were bored on a bore center that is off from the case bore center then that would explain it as well. The nominal bore center is 4.897"
The cheap easy fix is to bore the head registers larger (typically another ~.005" will do) to allow the jugs to settle into position. Typical register size is 105.0-105.1mm

Excellent info! I'm sending Everything out to get them checked. I have to send everything out anyways so no big deal (for once).

You need to also make sure that the head registers aren't to deep for the cylinders. Register depth needs to me a max of .260" for most iron cylinders.