Steering rack cover plate. Best way to remove/replace ?
 

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I removed it to look at the connections for the fuel tank and ran into a snag.

Is there an ideal method for removing and replace this plate?
Car on the ground? Off the ground? Both?

When I removed it, the car was already jacked off the ground. This put tension on the entire plate (b/c of the sway bar pushing on it) and it sort of had to be yanked off since it was getting hung up on the studs. Is it better to remove the rear hex bolts (top circle in the photo) while the car is down, before jacking? You can reach them from behind the tire. Then once jacked, I could remove the other 2 nuts?

More importantly, I had a heck of a time getting it back on. This was because when the car is on jackstands, the front wheels are not loaded. This makes the sway bar push down, since the wheels were hanging in the air. I was unable to push up the plate enough while also trying to thread the bolt.

After a while, I finally realized I could lower the car back onto the ground, to make the sway bar "retract", which would allow easier threading of the rear hex bolts.
I bolted up the 2 center nuts, to hold the plate in place, lowered the car down, smacked it with a rubber mallet to get it to seat,
and finally was able to thread and fasten the rear hex bolts....with the car on the ground.

http://i59.tinypic.com/ane8if.jpg

Not sure if ideal... I have a 1980 SC... I have a four post lift... Car up in the air - plate came off and went back on with ease.

I've removed it and put it back on several times. The car was on a lift and in the air. Then i removed the two nuts towards the front and the two bolts at the sway bar mounts.

It can take some coaxing at the sway bar mounts to get it back in but it is doable even while in the air.

I've done mine on jack stands several times. It does take a little coaxing. Any bolt that touches suspension parts can be a challenge at times regarding fit up. The rear two fasteners that go through the Sway Bar bushing mounts are the more difficult to put back.
If both front wheels are up, then the sway bar is simply swiveled down.

I have removed the bolts while the car is sitting on the ground, removed the shield and reinstalled the bolts. That has kept all aligned for me when I went to reinstall the shield.

I drove my front wheels up on rhino ramps. I like the ramps better than jack stands - when possible of course.

I had the same issue. It was because the plate was all dinged up and warped so the hole centers were narrower than they shoud be.

I used BFI, brute force and ignorance. I got the plate off and put it on a flat surface (read garage floor) and pounded it with the square end of a piece of 5" x 5" wood that was about 4ft long and weighed a fair bit. In 3 mins I had it pretty flat again and it went right back on no issues. The body of the car should not flex that much that would change the position on the holes, failing that if you absolutely had to you could open the holes in the plate up a wee bit only where needed.

I too recently encountered this problem while the car was on jackstands and was able to line up the allen head screws near the swaybar bushing by carefully placing a screwdriver through the hole and wedging the swaybar into alignment.