I'm hoping somebody can give me some advice on this because I'm down to two solution and want to do the right one so I dont do double the work later.

I have a 97 xj sport that has 235/75/15 tires on a set of AR-23 that came off a TJ the rims have 15x 8 stamped in them but they measure out to be 15x9 so they stick out further then stock which is okay but if I hit a hard enough bump the tires rub on the inner plastic liner and stock fender flare. I need to have the flares because MD state law says you are only allowed one tread outside but dont want to ruin my tires either I have replaced the rear shocks with a set of monroe load adjusting which help most of it and I do plan to put on the bushwacker flares when I can afford them plus I plan on doing atleast a 3 - 4.5 lift.

So should I chance removing my flares , replace leafsprings or just deal till I can get the fender flares. thanks for any help that anyone can provide

 

just get a cheap tera flex budget boost. you can always use it with other lifts, its grease able, and the rear shackles are very strong compared to most and it does not messup stock anything really. i found mine at the JY for $20(full set front and rear) the extra 1.5" lift is a nice extra too

 

I have thought about that to and figured it would allow my wife to get used to the height since she drives this daily do to her comute being shorter then mine to work.

The reason I'm leaning tward the other options I listed was that I could probably get the flares done this somer and my lift is not going to be untill fall or next spring and I do quite a bit of towing of a 5x8 open trailer during the spring/summer and didnt want to put extra stress on my leaf springs if thats wats causeing this issue and didnt know if anyone else has ad this problem before

 

what you could also do as a very cheap/effective fix is to get another main leaf from an XJ and cut the eyes off the end and place that in the leaf pack, it will help bump up the rear a little bit and since it is the same spring rate(not a stiff heavy spring rate like an AAL) it will not make the ride harsher. and having the extra leaf will help when towing too as it will give more support. what do your leaf springs look like now? are they concave, convex or flat?

 

here are pictures of when i did it to mine. the first is a close up of the end where i cut the eye off but left a little bit of curve to it as i tried to keep it as long as possible. the second is off the the secondary leafs i put in (making it a 6 leaf pack instead of a 4 leaf pack. i just cut down the second leafs slightly out of a donor pack so i got the final result of 2 main leafs, 2 secondary leafs, a single third leaf and the shortly leaf. it was an afternoon project that helped out alot. still the soft spring rate of the factory pack but i could put much more weight in the back without it sagging to much. it flexed really well too

 

I had the same issue and i just used a 4" bump stop. Problem Fixed...