Wranglerific

Hello all. After wanting to be a Jeeper my whole life, I finally pulled the trigger and got my first Wrangler. Its a 2012 Sahara 2D. It's basically bone stock, which is one of the things I liked about it, so I can make it mine. I'm interested in upgrading to 35" tires on it, and I know there's hundreds of threads already out there talking about what is needed to do this, and I've read a lot of them. But, I haven't been able to find any thread that talks about fenders. Here's my situation - I want to put a 2.5" suspension lift on, and I'll use and upgrade bump stocks and spacers as necessary to help fit the 35s, but every post I've read says that you may need trim fenders (and sometimes bumpers) to avoid rubbing. I have the painted fenders from the factory. Will I have to swap these for the plastic or is there a way, maybe with spacers, than I can leave these fenders on and avoid rubbing?

Any info is appreciated, and hopefully this isn't too dumb of a newb question.
Thanks.

nthinuf

It varies. Actual measured tire height for 35's could be 33", could be 34.5". Actual lift height from 2.5" coils could be 2", could be 3 or 4". If you find that the tires do rub, and if you don't want to cut the fenders or go to flats, then, as you mentioned, consider some combination of bumpstops/suspension lift/body lift/shorter tires.

Taller bumpstops - limit how far up the tires can move, can limit overall shock travel.
More lift height - causes more and more issues as height increases.
Body lift - higher center of gravity, does nothing for belly clearance, many don't care for the look, whatever else.
Smaller tires - yeah, nuf said about that...

There are plenty of threads/pics/youtube videos/etc about trimming fenders. (both painted and black plastic). How much you take off is completely up to you. Narrow, wide, just the side lip that hangs down to contact the tire? Look through the thousands of pics and see what you think. Another option is to watch Craigslist for a free/cheap set of takes-offs to chop up and keep your painted ones in storage or whatever.

tjkamp

I was running Teraflex 2.5 in 2 door springs (I highly do NOT recommend) with Teraflex 1.25 in lower bump stop additions. My tires are 315/70 r17 good year MTR Ks (measured 34.25 when new mounted on the Jeep). I got some pretty severe rubbing on the fenders at full flex with the sway bar disconnected, but If you don't rock crawl you will be fine, daily driving I had no issues with the set up.

I did come close to ripping the fenders off a couple of times in the rocks (had to replace the rear plastic push peg things with stainless steel bolts).

You will have to remove or trim the plastic front air dam that hangs from the factory front bumper.

Keep the Jeeps weight in mind when looking at springs, some are designed for stock weight, or lighter, Jeeps (I.e. Teraflex), and other plan for you to have steel bumpers and a winch.

Read as much as you can before you buy, and try to think about where you want your Jeep to end up as you are planning your build.

Backspacing on your wheels comes into play as well, I'm running 4.75in backspacing, with no issues.

I am currently running the same tires with Rock Krawler 3.5 in 2 door springs, netting me about 2.75-3 in. of lift, (my Jeep is overweight) and 2.75 in front bump stops, and I have no rubbing issues at all. (This may be a bit more bump stop than I need, but I haven't had time to get it on a ramp lately.

Happy Jeeping!