Probably only noticeable when parking a fully loaded wagon on a steep incline. But yes it's a valid point. MB saw fit to equip the wagon with beefier parking brake shoes for a reason.

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1998 E300 turbodiesel

America's Rights and Freedoms Are Not The Enemy!

You always have the transmission pawl as a backup when you park. I think the wide shoe would be important if you needed to use it as an emergency brake.

Modern cars have dual diagonal hydraulic circuits for the brakes. A sudden catastrophic failure of the braking system is nearly impossible, so I would not view the parking brake as an emergency brake - some new cars that have an electronic parking brake will not even allow you engage it while the vehicle is in motion, so it does not function as an emergency brake at all on those cars. Those two little drums are not going to slow the car from highway speed anyways, in an effective way. Additionally the parking pawl has been known to break off, and using it exclusively puts undue stress on transmission internals.

The correct way to park an automatic vehicle is to put the transmission into neutral, set the parking brake, remove your foot entirely from the brake pedal allowing the weight of the car to rest against the parking brake, and then lastly shift the transmission from neutral to park. This eliminates the stress from the parking pawl, and uses the parking brake as intended. The shoes performing as intended are therefore a rather important part of the system.

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1998 E300 turbodiesel

America's Rights and Freedoms Are Not The Enemy!

This isn't funny now.

Ordered rear rotors from dealer. Tried to install. Same issue. Once rotor retaining screw is tightened, wheel won't turn. Confirmed this with both sides.

Also removed the parking brake shoes entirely. Made no difference.

Interference is not with the parking brake shoes, its with the backing plate. All the rotors have a pronounced lip around the perimeter of the inside rim of the hat. That isn't fitting properly into the groove around the inside of the backing plate. That's all we can see.

Rotors Mercedes sold me are 210 423 05 12 64. I have looked online and with the exception of the 64 tacked on the end, that seems to be the correct number.

My mechanic used to own this car. He did the brakes once while he had it, with Zimmerman. He then sold it to a customer about four or five years ago. That guy did the brakes 18 months ago with cheapo white box parts. Never was there any fitment issue, either time.

I have now tried Zimmerman, white box and dealer rotors. While we confirmed with the supplier that the Zimm rotors she was sent were a 'crossover' part number, my mechanic's partner measured then against the Mercedes ones and says they are absolutely identical in every dimension except that the hat on the dealer ones is a hair larger diameter.

The old rotors, in other words the ones that fit, are a hair shallower if you measure their height. Luckily they are still functional, just warped.