Yup, there are a lot of tricks, I've even made press in steel sleeves, to reomve that terrible "step" in the exhaust port...
then fab up header stubs of the internal size I want, and port match them, before continuing with the complete header...
I also do my own head milling...
And sometimes you come across a project where a certain tool would be most helpful, an electric hack saw, fow exaple...clamp everything down, turn it on, and walk away....slow, but it can cut quite a lot of steel all at once, without an attendant, like a band saw....so when in need...build it...
LOL...I love to tinker, and if I ain't modifying engines or parts of engines, sometimes I have to build the tools to do the job I invisualize...