Cylinder deactivation symbol?
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Cylinder deactivation symbol?
Does the straight 6 petrol engine 48v have cylinder deactivation? And if so, how do you know it’s activated? I know some mercs have the blue symbol on the dash but I’ve never seen that on mine?
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Yes, your straight-six M256 engine has cylinder deactivation. It typically doesn't show a dedicated blue symbol on your dash when active. You know it's working when you're cruising lightly (often between 1,200-3,200 RPM) and the ECO symbol in the instrument cluster turns a solid green color. You won't feel or hear a difference.
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Yes, your straight-six M256 engine has cylinder deactivation. It typically doesn't show a dedicated blue symbol on your dash when active. You know it's working when you're cruising lightly (often between 1,200-3,200 RPM) and the ECO symbol in the instrument cluster turns a solid green color. You won't feel or hear a difference.
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Joined: Dec 2024
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Yes, your straight-six M256 engine has cylinder deactivation. It typically doesn't show a dedicated blue symbol on your dash when active. You know it's working when you're cruising lightly (often between 1,200-3,200 RPM) and the ECO symbol in the instrument cluster turns a solid green color. You won't feel or hear a difference.
Interesting. I Also thought that cylinder de-activation was only present on the v8’s.
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Yes, your straight-six M256 engine has cylinder deactivation. It typically doesn't show a dedicated blue symbol on your dash when active. You know it's working when you're cruising lightly (often between 1,200-3,200 RPM) and the ECO symbol in the instrument cluster turns a solid green color. You won't feel or hear a difference.
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Yes, your straight-six M256 engine has cylinder deactivation. It typically doesn't show a dedicated blue symbol on your dash when active. You know it's working when you're cruising lightly (often between 1,200-3,200 RPM) and the ECO symbol in the instrument cluster turns a solid green color. You won't feel or hear a difference.
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True. And let me just add, even in the V8 which is the only config that has the cylinder deactivation feature, it is barely balanced when 1 bank is off and that is what’s causing the harmonic vibration (unavoidable) despite the dampeners that Mbenz tried to add. Cylinder deactivation is really bad, very dumb, engineering decision. We are paying for a ton of useless features, components and items just for the same of emissions and efficiency and it’s sad. MSRP could be less, reliability could be better, and complexity would have been reduced.
Last edited by S_W222; Jan 12, 2026 at 05:19 PM.
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That’s not true. Only the W222 V8 engines (M176/M177) in the S560 and S63 have cylinder deactivation. That feature shuts down four cylinders (one side/bank of the engine) under light loads. The inline-6 (or the V6 for US cars) doesn’t a cylinder deactivation feature. If you are referring to the “sailing" or “Coasting” feature (entire engine shuts off while coasting at highway speeds) that’s something else and different from the cylinder deactivation.
True. And let me just add, even in the V8 which is the only config that has the cylinder deactivation feature, it is barely balanced when 1 bank is off and that is what’s causing the harmonic vibration (unavoidable) despite the dampeners that Mbenz tried to add. Cylinder deactivation is really bad, very dumb, engineering decision. We are paying for a ton of useless features, components and items just for the same of emissions and efficiency and it’s sad. MSRP could be less, reliability could be better, and complexity would have been reduced.
The logic makes sense, running on 3 cylinders isn't a good idea. The V8 running on four cylinder creating vibration makes sense as well because four cylinders are not balanced unlike inline-6. I wish MB allows you an option to turn it off without having to go into the less sporty drive modes.
I want to mention economy brands like mazda have cylinder deactivation on their four cylinders but they have a 2.5L displacement and only on their naturally aspirated and non turbo models. not sure if true but I heard CD caused lots of major engine damage over the years in those particular examples as well as vibrations as mentioned. For that reason, they discontinued CD in the 2026 model year mazda3 while they were at it, they got rid of start/stop as well. Although the latter was also hated mainly because it didn't have 48V like MBs.
