Okay I understood it to be that a tall gear was a gear that allowed you to go fast and keep the RPMs low. Like Corvettes with their top-gear cruise of like 1,600rpm at 80mph. And short gears to be like my Civic Si 6MT was, requiring constant changing. I guess I should go back and study my terminology again

Sorry dood, I had it switched around. I learned the tall/short thing from a non-car guy. Just did a quick google search and no, you are absolutely right. Sorry for messing you up.

Posts have been fixed.

Oh okay, I was looking at stuff again going "WTF!".. glad we got it straight now. I will agree with you now, 1st gear is too short.

i use s always. in traffic i use w though because i get sick of the car shifting so much.

1st is a very "short" gear to get rolling when carrying a lot of weight or on very steep hills. I find that people only complain about it when their gearboxes get a bit clunky. When the box is smooth you hardly notice that the car has even used 1st gear.

^ 2nd gear is more than enough to get the car rolling, even when full and on a steep uphill.

I was driving my c240 into work today and noticed the high rpm's and wanted to check this site on any posts on this issue. My numbers are exactly the same as yours. Thank you for asking the question!!

my c240 is about the same. it little lower rpm on the highway. I did do some mods to mine.

I'm at about 3,100 RPM at 80MPH. I could have sworn I was lower than that before I put on my winter tires but it looks like it matches up with everyone else's numbers.

I saw some responses about the two driving modes, and what they actually do. When in (s) mode the car will start in 1st, but it also makes the transmission shift more aggressively , while at the same time holding the gear a little longer depending on driving situation. When in (w) mode, you start out in 2nd gear and it shifts smoother between gears. Also, the car has 2 reverse gear ratios, one for (w) and (s), try it out for yourself and see.

hey Andy I have a 04 c230 kompressor and also thought it seemed to be high rev or rpm’s to be turning 3000 at 70mph and when I let off gas at interstate speeds also trans slows it doesn’t coast. It’s 3300 at 75mph. But no other car I’ve ever owned did this so seemed odd. So I googled it and found this thread. Makes me feel a little better