# Talk:M8 armored gun system

According to The USA Historical AFV Register (unreliable source ofc), there is a Close Combat Vehicle Light outside the National Museum of Military Vehicles. This was the same one that was displayed by the Military Vehicle Technology Foundation (Jacques Littlefield's collection) and sold at auction. There isn't so much as a placard on the display. NMMV does not mention the CCVL on their site, so this is impossible to verify. Schierbecker (talk) 07:35, 18 September 2022 (UTC)

Responding to your query at MilHist. I am struggling to to find time to work on my own articles, so won't be able to give a proper review. But, based on a skim and a more detailed look at a couple of sections it seems a long way off. I would suggest putting it through GoCER, then PR, and then coming back at MilHist. 
A few of the things which jumped out:

Unencyclopedic language: reincarnated, tried to kill the tank.
Unexplained technical terminology: begin fielding, type classified, rebooted program, level I armor, the period FY98–03, rubber band tracks, Milestone I/II review.
Unclear phrasing: Does "over the objections of" mean 'against the wishes of' or 'because of the objections of'? Does "loading the tank" really mean that, or does it mean loading the tank's gun?
It is very long. Very much so for a weapon system which never got past the prototype stage.
"authorized the Army to proceed with the development of the AGS. The Army believed that replacing the Sheridan with an off-the-shelf AGS". How can developing a new tank be seen as "off the shelf"? "$42.5 million ($83.9 million in 2022)".
"to partially fill the Sheridan's role." Which was?
Too much detail almost throughout. (Initial efforts jumps out re this, but there are plenty of other sections with the same issue.)
Too many single sentence paragraphs.
Too many bulleted lists
Lack of linking or explanation. Eg what is an "autoloader".
Unnecessary use of past tense. Eg "The end of the Cold War had precipitated".
Inconsistent capitalisation. Eg "Senate Armed Services Committee" but " House appropriations national security subcommittee".
Too many subsections. Especially in Variants.
Some of which are in turn splintered. Eg Miscellaneous has 73 words split into 6 sentences and 3 paragraphs.
Gallery: There are two images labelled "Rear", the first of which seems to convey no information to a reader. "Fire extinguisher pull handles"; oh come on! Two images of smoke grenade launchers - as well as the one in the Protection section?
This is from a skim and is very non-exhaustive. I am sure this is not what you were hoping for, but it seemed better to lay how I saw the article out here that in an actual FAC. Gog the Mild (talk) 12:35, 11 January 2024 (UTC)
Comment This is the sort of thing that you can expect at FAC, which is a gauntlet. Suggest reading the series on The long road of a featured article candidate. Keep your cool, respond to comments firmly but politely. I am willing to co-nominate if you think it would help. Or you can consider Peer review.

Article are as long as they need to be. At 6,646 words, you are not in WP:TOOLONG territory. Defend claims of too much detail by pointing out that the FAC criteria require it to be "comprehensive: it neglects no major facts or details and places the subject in context". Although it was a weapon system which never got past the prototype stage, it is of great interest for this very reason. Readers will have come across it while reading about procurement.
"autoloader" is linked (just not on first use - correct this). I would think that any reader who is into tanks would know what one is. You could consider adding a one-sentence explanation for someone who does not know and cannot guess. Of course, only a knowledgeable reader would be aware of the controversy surrounding the use of autoloaders.
Ignore comments along the lines of "unencyclopedic". Nobody knows what that means.
On the other hand, "over the objections of" is plain English, and everyone should know what it means.
Just because you didn't write it the way a reviewer would have, doesn't mean you have done anything wrong. In particular, there are no rules about the number of sections.
Address the issues that are actionable, namely:
Consider merging some of the single sentence paragraphs
Consider merging some of the single paragraph subsections. (The ones in Variants are okay, as it aids the readers
Consider cutting back the number of images in the gallery
Fix the inconsistent capitalisation
Remove the links and footnotes from the subsection headings; move the footnotes into the prose and substitute a {{main article}} template for the links
Add a reference to fn 10
Shufelt (1993) is not used - remove or move to a Further reading section
Where "This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain" appears, that means that text has been copied verbatim. Wherever that is not the case, remove this template.
Hawkeye7 (discuss) 18:17, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for your comments, and I appreciate your offer, Hawkeye. Regarding the length, it's uncommon for a tank to have a 40-year nearly continuous development cycle without going into production. The nearest example I can think of is the Expeditionary tank or maybe the T-84. It would be as if the Yugo GV came out in 1985 and no one bought it, but Zastava continued to update the car through six presidential administrations and two company mergers. That would make for a pretty long and interesting article. I'd split this but I don't think we're there yet. I can say some stuff in fewer words, but I expect this article's length will increase rather than decrease over time as I research more details, particularly about the early history.
I'm going to table any notions of FAC for now, at least until I can see Hunnicutt's notes at Fort Moore. Schierbecker (talk) 06:15, 27 January 2024 (UTC)