Ok I'm stumped. Rear end help please!

Ford 8.8 that I'm trying to setup. I'm having trouble setting the pinion depth. Every time I try a new shim, I then put in the carrier and shim it correctly for .008 to .0012 of backlash measured with a dial indicator.

The pinion is stamped Ford. Started with .033 of pinion shim, then went to .027, now I just tried .011 of shim. Each shim gives me a gear pattern showing contact on the inner side of the ring gear on the drive side of the teeth, and contact toward the outside of the teeth on the coast side. The .011 shim was an improvement, but the edge of the pinion teeth only make contact on the inner half edge of the drive side teeth. What should my next step be?

Also, I'm tightening the pinion nut until there is no play in it, leaving the crush sleeve out until I'm ready to use it. I will double check the inner bearing race is all the way seated, but I would think the force of tightening everything down would have sucked it up in there.