Talk:HMS Agincourt (1865)

1875-1877 Re-armament

Text reads : "After another two years' good service, Agincourt was paid off in 1875 for re-armament, trading her outdated muzzle loading guns for new breach-loading ones".

This doesn't match the infobox, and the new generation of breechloaders didnot arrive until 1880. Accodring to Brassey's in 1888 she had 17 12-ton (i.e. 9-inch) muzzle-loaders, which does match the infobox. The stuff about breechloaders cannot be correct. Also, the stuff in the infobox about 20-pounder smoothbores is a bit odd for 1875. What it looks like happened in the refit is that the 7-inch RMLs were replaced by a lesser number of 9-inch RMLs. Rcbutcher (talk) 15:15, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:HMS Agincourt (1865)/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Ealdgyth (talk · contribs) 21:12, 3 July 2013 (UTC) I'll be reviewing this article shortly. Ealdgyth - Talk 21:12, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose): b (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists):

   A few spots of confusion with the prose

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a (reference section): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):

   One spot where the text contradicts itself.

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   Fair representation without bias:

5. It is stable.

   No edit wars, etc.:

6. It is illustrated by images and other media, where possible and appropriate.

   a (images are tagged and non-free content have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):

7. Overall:

   Pass/Fail:

• Lead:
  • Sentence fragment: "Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee Fleet Review in 1887."
    • Ooops.
• Design:
  • How many ships in the class?
    • Added.
  • Jargon alert - "long between perpendiculars" ... huh?
    • Would you prefer between stem and sternpost with links? I've used that phrase probably a hundred times and you're the first person to comment on it. I'm not sure what else I can do since it's a very technical measurement of length to begin with.
• Propulsion:
  • "enough to steam 1,500 nmi (2,800 km; 1,700 mi) at" not a fan of the use of abbreviations without explanation here .. I realize there is a link, but can we do a "nautical miles (nmi)" thing instead?
    • Yes, I don't know how that slipped in there since I dislike abbreviations for units, especially on first use.
  • Clunky "Because the ship's propeller could only be disconnected and not hoisted up into the stern of the ship to reduce drag..." suggest rewording. Perhaps "Agincourt only made 9.5 knots (17.6 km/h; 10.9 mph) under sail, mainly due to the inability of the propeller to be hoisted out of the water and into the stern to avoid drag when not in use."
    • • Yes, much better.
• Armament:
  • "All four nine-inch and 20 seven-inch guns were mounted on..." MOS here ... "All 4 nine-inch and 20 seven-inch guns were mounted on... " or "All four nine-inch and twenty seven-inch guns were mounted on..." Suggest going with the second, since the next sentence uses "eight". (If I repeat myself enough you'll eventually learn this rule, right?)
  • Again "17 nine-inch guns, 14 on the main deck, two forward chase guns and one rear chase gun" should be "17 nine-inch guns, 14 on the main deck, 2 forward chase guns and 1 rear chase gun"
    • This is not coming naturally to me as I've had years and hundreds of articles where I always ignored that part of the MOS and nobody called me on it. Still trying to get use to it. Prepare a 2 × 4 beam for further use.
  • "£250 each" - conversion to modern money if possible?
    • I can, but I don't think it would necessarily be valid because these were capital costs. I had a very long discussion a couple of years ago as to why that was a problem.
• Construction:
  • "by the Laird's at its shipyard" "The"?
  • "£483,003" conversion to modern money if possible?
  • "together with her half-sister Northumberland was to tow" - okay, you need to explain that half-sister bit here in the article. As a horseperson, all I could think was that the ships had the same moms but different dads and I then spent like 30 seconds giggling to myself before I could click on the link to figure out what it really meant. MOst folks know vaguely what a "sister ship" is but they are going to boggle at "half-sister ship" ... so best to explain (an explanatory footnote is fine).
    • Always glad to add a note of laughter in the deadly serious business of Wiki; it's a nice contrast to all the drama! The process isn't fundamentally much different with ships except that conception usually takes place in a variety of people's heads.
• A bit of confusion - one place you say "she became the flagship of the second-in-command of the fleet until she began a refit in 1873." but later "In 1873, Vice Admiral Sir Geoffrey Hornby, commander of the Channel Fleet, transferred his flag to Agincourt as her sister Minotaur, his former flagship, was taken in hand for a refit that lasted until 1875. That year Agincourt was paid off in turn for a refit and re-armament that lasted until 1877." From that second bit, I take it that in 1873 Agincourt became the flagship until her refit began in 1875, but that clashes with the first bit...
  • Initially she served as the second-in-command's flagship, but she became the fleet commander's flagship, while his own flagship was refitting. I tried to clarify that by emphasizing that Hornby was the fleet commander, not the second-in-command. If you've got a suggest how to make that clearer
• 1871:
  • "That year she was again paid off and" ... err.. what year? Last bit we were discussing was her serving as flagship for 15 admirals.
    • 1875, the date at the end of the preceding sentence.

I've put the article on hold for seven days to allow folks to address the issues I've brought up. Feel free to contact me on my talk page, or here with any concerns, and let me know one of those places when the issues have been addressed. If I may suggest that you strike out, check mark, or otherwise mark the items I've detailed, that will make it possible for me to see what's been addressed, and you can keep track of what's been done and what still needs to be worked on. Ealdgyth - Talk 21:32, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the review. Happy to give you an opportunity for a laugh and to umlimber a 2 × 4 for forgetting all the implications of that MOS rule.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 08:07, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

It all looks good. Passing it now. Ealdgyth - Talk 12:47, 4 July 2013 (UTC)