They're pulling a jack, piston is out and about 4'of the cylinder is cut off. The remaining part of the cylinder slide through the clamp and is down in the pvc. They said they tried burning a hole to get a hook through it but the fumes from the pvc is too much. Any ideas?

Google "plate clamp". We had well drillers on a job recently and they used these clamps to hoist all their casing vertically. You could probably use these to grab two sides of the casing on top to pull it out of the PVC .

Don't tell me new mechanic an old timer told them use 2 clamps an they new more.I just retrieved one same thing lol strong magnet but short piston

Plate clamp And I always blow a hole through put an iron rod through 5 feet down then cut off above that so it can’t go anywhere

I shot them the information and they got it out. In this day of safety and don't use homemade tools, they were using wooden clamps with steel channel backing. I told them they need to through them in the trash and drop the S-bomb on their superintendent.