after noticing this subject in the archives, I decided to bring it up on an "open forum"

We recently had to pull a painstakingly amount of nails out of salvaged oak timbers. The barn must have had about four different sidings or roof sheathings because there must have been about 10 nails per linear foot. Anyway must all of the nails heads were gone and if they weren't they broke off very easily when trying to pry them free.

My question is what methods are out there for pulling nails that are submerged or flush with the face?

We experimented and ended up with a pretty good method.
We took needlenose pliers (must be prepared to sacrifice) and set the pliers with a hammer around the nail in the wood. We then took vice grips and cinched around the pliers as close to the wood as possible. Then we took a long prybar went under the vice grips and pried while persuading the needlenose. Worked pretty good and did not leave to much damage. Any other ways?