rear caliper question

[egchewy79]

posted this on the other forum as well, but no hits thus far...
replacing rear pads with Hawks. my calipers are new castings of 87-88 Tbird calipers from FFR. I'm finding it extremely hard/impossible to get both shims and and pads in place. Any issues just using one or no shims? I know the idea of the shim is to allow the pad to slide along a smoother surface, but can only seem to fit one shim in. The alternative is to grind down the ends of the pad a bit.
TIA.

the type of shims I have are shown below.
https://ic.carid.com/centric/products/117-61019_1.jpg

[Chadillac]

I had the same issue. I gave up and didn't use the shims, but I haven't driven the car yet. Following for a response.

[egchewy79]

I had the same issue. I gave up and didn't use the shims, but I haven't driven the car yet. Following for a response.

I actually have 200mi on mine w/ the stock pads w/o any issues and no shims, mainly because I couldn't figure out where they went when I was first assembling the rear calipers. I just figured that I'd try to use them while changing out the pads and feel like the FF castings are a bit too tight compared to the pads. I feel like the areas where the ends of the pad rub are "smooth enough" but didn't know if anyone else had more experience with this.