Talk:M249 light machine gun/GA1

GA Review

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• The lede part that says "the gun provides accurate fire approaching that of a rifle yet gives the heavy volume of fire common to a machine gun". But the background section says "was not as effective when fired from the shoulder". So, the lede should be more precise and say that "When fired from a bipod..." or similar.

Done

• The "Reception was mixed..." could be in a separate section or a subsection of the design section. (it's not background anymore). Or change "background" to "history". There's some overlap in scope with the "Feedback" subsection, although that deals mostly with more recent evaluations.

I have renamed the section to "History". I agree that it is a more appropriate name.

• There's too much copy&paste between lede and design section, which should be reworded in one of the places:
  • "A folding bipod with adjustable legs is attached near the front of the weapon and a fixed tripod is available."
  • "A folding bipod with adjustable legs is attached near the front of the weapon, though a fixed tripod is also available."

Rephrased. Sentence now reads "A folding bipod is attached near the front of the gun, though fixed tripod is also issued to troops.".

• The same goes for:
  • "the gun provides accurate fire approaching that of a rifle yet gives the heavy volume of fire common to a machine gun"
  • "The gun provides accurate fire approaching that of a rifle yet gives the heavy volume of fire common to a machine gun."

I removed the second instance in the design section.

• And
  • "The M249 is gas-operated and air-cooled with a quick-change barrel to prevent overheating; each gunner is issued a spare."
  • "To prevent overheating and jams the gun has a quick-change barrel and each gunner is issued with a spare."

I rephrased the first instance so it reads "It has a quick-change barrel so that an overheated or jammed barrel may be rapidly replaced by the gunner."

• The fact that if fires 5.56x45mm NATO is repeated a bit too much, and the ammo type is linked towards the end of the article instead of the beginning.

The calibre is now onlyr mentioned in the design section and in the infobox.

Xasodfuih (talk) 16:20, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the review.--Patton^t/c 17:02, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Good job. There's one more formal issue: the feedback section needs some footnote refs. Undoubtedly those reports exist, but the GA criteria asks for that kind of formal refs (or Harvard style citations, but this article like most others uses inline refs). Xasodfuih (talk) 17:25, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Well the references are asctually in the text; "April 2002, A "Lessons Learned in Afghanistan" report by LTC Charlie Dean and SFC Sam Newland of the U.S. Army Natick Soldier Center" and "15 May 2003, An "Operation Iraqi Freedom PEO Soldier Lessons Learned" report by LTC Jim Smith, U.S. Army", but what the hell will add the refs.--Patton^t/c 17:40, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

I've found a mirror for the slides of the presentation with statistics, and added it to the footnote. The other two Army refs are more of a personal opinion, so there's not much point brooding over them. I'm giving this article a GA pass. Xasodfuih (talk) 18:04, 3 January 2009 (UTC)