Have you looked in the 700/900 FAQs yet? I don’t know if it says anything about replacing a head/head gasket, but I know it has a section for the timing belt. If you are a bit careful and crafty, you can pull the head and leave the t-belt in place, but if you have the square tooth belt the replace interval is 50,000 miles, and I think it is 100k for the round tooth.

Have you run a compression test on it and checked the valve clearance? Maybe it doesn’t need a valve job. If that’s the case, you could just have it checked for flat, and adjust the valves, and replace the valve hushers. I don’t know how many miles are on your car or if it ever had a valve job in the past, and I don’t know if it is a nice car that you don’t mind spending on, or if it is an old dog. But, it may be worth considering if you need the valve job.

With enough heat, you shouldn’t usually break the exhaust manifold studs. I don’t know what you have for a torch, but if you don’t have oxy-acetylene, the more expensive soldering torches with the auto-start trigger seem to get hotter than the cheap ones. I have turned axel u-bolt nuts red hot with those.

There is no way I can answer your big question since I don’t know your ability, I don’t know your tool supply, and I don’t know what you consider too difficult.

Charley