Flirc Case V2.1 thermal pad incompatibility

[Remon]

Recently I bought a Flirc case for my Raspberry Pi 4. I liked it so much that I also ordered Flirc cases for my two other Raspberry Pi 3B+'s. So far so good.

Before arrival I watched a couple of unboxing reviews on Youtube. In the more recent videos I saw there were 2 thermal pads supplied with the case. One for the 2B/3B and a thinner one for the 3B+ because it has a taller chip.

After arrival I saw there was only 1 thermal pad supplied with each case. According to the store's website (TinyTronics.nl) it's now only compatible with the newer 3B and the 3B+ with the taller metal chip.

On this forum I found the thermal pad thickness should be 0.4 mm: 

However, I did measure it with calipers and the thickness is 1.13 mm with the plastic and paper still on. After removing those I measured those and combined they are 0.13 mm. So the thermal pad is 1.0 mm exactly.

Despite all of this my Pi 3B+ doesn't fit in the case. When inserting the board into the case with the HDMI-port side first and pushing the board down, the ports grab into the case cutouts and won't let me push it all the way down. I feel resistance because the leverage and the GPIO side on the board hovers a couple of mm above the screw holes and the USB ports are inaccessible that way. Pushing it down any further would break stuff.

TinyTronics told me they tested it with a 3B+ and they have no issues. They also told me that Flirc now ship the cases with a single thermal pad that fits all 2B/3B(+) Pi's. In my situation that's not the case unfortunately.

I was thinking of what the cause could be. The issue might be different batches of the Pi 3B+ from different factories/countries over the past couple of years. One with a taller chip than the others. Or with a thicker layer of solder? I also mentioned this to TinyTronics.

Finally I tested it with scotch tape. I used multiple layers and ended up with 0.4 mm. This is the correct and desired thickness. But where can I find 12x12 mm pads with 0.4 mm thickness? Preferably the original ones that once were supplied by default with the Flirc cases in the recent past.

Edited January 7, 2022 by Remon
Typos

[Remon]

In addition to my previous post:

I did some more tests. Even without thermal pad the protruding part of the case is making contact with the chip on my Raspberry Pi 3B+.

Unfortunately I think my Pi got damaged in the testing process. Suddenly all the LAN LED's are on (also the green one while I'm on gigabit) even with the Pi being shut down. 

This is a huge setback for me because this will cost me money and because new boards are sold out everywhere.

Edited January 8, 2022 by Remon