A couple of nuts and minutes later and her we can see the valve train. There should be MUCH more oil hanging around this area. It's super shiny clean and it's been washed clean simply from coolant getting around this area. Ah well the head is really heavy iron and very tough. I'm not anticipating much damage.
And once the cams and pushrods have been removed we are ready to lift off the cylinder head. It takes quite a lot of force to lift up and pull away the head. Unless you have a solid copper gasket you are going to need to use a decent size prybar to jerk the head free. Mine took a LOT of force to lift off. Make sure you have a friend ready to help you lift it off. It's not as easy as it looks in my pictures. Make sure to mark the pushrods and put them back in the same holes when ready to reassemble.
And below I don't see anything surprising here. I do see a really shitty head gasket though. No stress, that's why we're here. The arrangement of studs really is a weakness in the first place but what can you do... it's a classic car not a high HP free revving race engine. It's going to be more than a few minutes of work to surface the block. I'm not looking forward to cleaning up around those studs and cylinders. Nothing scary here but just some good ol' fashioned elbow grease is required indeed.
Another note... a couple of the studs were NOT even close to being at the correct torque when I was removing the nuts. I'm sure this is due to fatigue from both age and some slight overheating. ARP makes a kit that will surely provide some good piece of mind when putting the pedal to the metal. It will be a good investment as this car will surely be making some trips to Monterey CA and Santa Barbera as well. I would also like to see the addition of a modern aftermarket alloy cylinder head. The original head was designed with materials which were suitable for 1980 fuel and oil. Since the fuels of today lack the lubricating agents of yesterday an additive is needed to prolong the life of the valves and guides. Companies today now offer MG cylinder heads with properly designed valves and made from modern metals with modern casting techniques.