Quote:
Originally Posted by Mike Tee 
The reason the CVT sails up to the high RPM is that the B 200 develops its peak torque at a high 3500-4000 RPM, which is where the engine begins to sound coarse and gets noisy. The CVT will always do this, get to the heart of the torque band when accelerating moderately.
Even a pepère driver has to hammer it once in a while, to merge onto a freeway for example, so it is not a moot point.
Other unrefined aspects: the CVT hunts and makes the car wobble (as though the car has warped brake discs) a bit when slowing to a stop, as though the CVT is "gearing down" through the pseudo-gears. I found that annoying and surprising. I am sure it's unnecessary. It's almost as though there were wear points on the variable diameter drums that were causing this, but the three CVT cars I drove had few km, so that shouldn't be it.
I also didn't like the CVT's tendency to use engine braking on downhill runs, where in the manual car I'd be running out in 5th to keep the fuel consumption to zero for a longer distance and time.
Sure, many if not all of these problems can be overcome by shifting the car manually through its seven virtual gears, but then: why buy an automatic if you need to shift it manually (and 40% more often than the manual on the B 200) to enjoy a smooth, brisk and serene ride in all road conditions?
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I have this jerking happening when I break ... a bit annoying, but not unbearable. As for the pepère driving going over the 3000rpm, my girlfriend drives like that but the tach never gets over 2500-2750rpm ...
It all comes to preferences and I think for those who likes an auto tranny will appreciate the CVT on this Merc.
D