MR2QIK
Not convinced about your rear tyre solution though. Did you shave off those tabs? You'd want the grip of those RE002's when you're on E85.

Don't you have 225s on the rear? lol

I just got back from the tyre place with the Pirellis now on my rear rims. I'll put the wheels back on my MR2 tonight or tomorrow night and see how it goes.
I haven't changed those tabs under the rear fender, but they have already been bent upwards, and I don't want to remove more screws.
I think the RE002s have quite a vertical side-wall design, and 265 is already quite wide for a 9 inch wide rim. The sidewalls look a bit too bulgy for my liking anyway. By changing to a different brand of tyre, and taking 20mm off the width, I should get quite a lot more fender clearance. I know that I'll need lots of grip on E85, but a good quality 245 tyre will still be decent.

265 is way to big for a 9" rim.
235-245 would be a lot better

Beg to differ with the above. i have 255 on my 18x9's and they have small stretch. 
 
265 would be fine. i wouldn't put 245 in place of a 265 any day of the week. 
 
There are people running 275's for gods sake :)

Anyway, don't wanna burst your bubble but those tabs caused rubbing on my 18x9's with 235/40's. Gotta ditch em. Just keep the Bridgeys for later.

Btw, my other car has 255's on a 8.5inch wide rim & it doesn't even look too wide....lol Not all tyres are equal though.

kameleon
Beg to differ with the above. i have 255 on my 18x9's and they have small stretch. 
265 would be fine. i wouldn't put 245 in place of a 265 any day of the week. 
There are people running 275's for gods sake :)

255s and 265s are totally acceptable to use on 9 inch rims, but for my particular application (ie. my desired fender clearance, appearance, the offset of my rims, etc), the 265s weren't quite right, especially with the more vertical and bulgy sidewalls of the RE002s in general. I almost chose 255 replacements, but I'm really interested to see how the 245s improve my fender clearance. They may not help much, but I have a feeling they will.
 

MR2QIK
Anyway, don't wanna burst your bubble but those tabs caused rubbing on my 18x9's with 235/40's. Gotta ditch em. Just keep the Bridgeys for later.

In terms of clearance, there is a big difference betwee 40 profile and 35 profile. I know this because of the problems I had with 40 profile tyres on the front of my car briefly. I'll definitely keep an eye on those tabs though, as I know they are troublesome.
BTW, being that my MR2 is not a daily driver, it takes a long time to go through tyres, so it's not really worth keeping extras. Also, now that I've already got the new tyres on my rear rims, I don't want to change them again for ages if I can help it. Every time tyres get changed, there is a risk of the rims getting scratched by the tyre shop.
 

MR2QIK
Not all tyres are equal though.

This! My front tyres have a noticeably different sidewall shape compared to the rears, regardless of the difference in stretch.

There's an even bigger difference with 40's on the front....lol 235/40 is a common tyre to use for slight stretch & clearance assistance on a rear.

Anyway, it's done. Ditch the damn tabs & you surely won't hear that dreaded scrub for the rest of your MR2 days :)

After all that, I've decided to swap the 245s for 255s haha. I'm hopeless. Luckily the tyre shop had no problem with it, probably because I'm still getting P Zeros and just changing the size.
 
It wasn't the discussions on here that made me change my mind though. It's because last night I put the wheels on the car with the 245s, and immediately they looked too small, more so than I expected.

I used 255's on the rear of my old car and it gripped quite well as long as the road surface was decent. I think they were Yokahama S-Drives.

Haha you have changed tyres more than I have in the 14 11ish years I've owned my car