Please note: I don't own one of these direct injection engines with the 'How Many Cylinders Now?' bug/feature.
That said ...
There are two situations during which I see MINIMAL harm in this feature being active:
1. 0% throttle decelerations (aka Decel Fuel Cut Off / DFCO)
2. Whenever the engine coolant temp has exceeded somewhere between 221F / 105C & 230F / 110C
(I'm using that coolant temp threshold as a proxy for being in danger of overheating)
1. While you happen to be decelerating @ 0% TPS, you don't need ANY cylinders,
the road is effectively turning the wheels, which are turning the axles, which are turning the transmission, which is turning the engine,
because no cylinders are receiving ANY fuel anyway - so it's kind of a moot point.
2. It should be a well-known fact that Chrysler's earliest attempts at Engine Half@$$ allowed the 4 lazy cylinders to get so cold,
they cracked engine blocks.
IFF the engine is in danger of overheating, running on the minimum number of cylinders needed and varying them moment-to-moment
may help to keep engine temps down in all 8 cylinder sleeves, or at least delay overheating by a minute or two, which may be very helpful
Under the vast majority of normal driving circumstances, however,
there is NO REASON to have Cylinder Confusion enabled *except possibly for the two caveats above*.
This gentleman brings up a good point regarding the lack of oil flow to the DFM lifters after running this product long term. Link to video:
Actually he does NOT.
NOTE: THE FOLLOWING IS *WRONG.
PLEASE CAREFULLY READ THE CORRECTION IN POST #75 BY
@RG23RST.
*(The way On/Off lifters work, is when the cylinder goes lazy / Off, oil flow is DENIED to that cylinder's lifters.
So when the engine is in V8 mode, oil is pumping those lifters up, same as it's worked since hydraulic lifters first started replacing solid lifters.)*
On / Off lifters will last longest if they are always left ON / if Cylinder Confusion is disabled.