The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was no consensus. The arguments to merge are strongest, in my view, but nonetheless do not have clear consensus. Vanamonde (Talk) 17:19, 22 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

AN/ARC-182 (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log | edits since nomination)
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Following Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/AN/ARC-27, here's another case of a catalogue-like, poorly referenced entry about a piece of military equipment that seems to fail WP:GNG. My BEFORE, again, failed to locate anything but a few passing mentions that suffice to confirm this entity exists/ed, but not that it is notable. More cleanup of Category:Aircraft stations is likely still needed. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 05:02, 22 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Delete, per nom Andre🚐 05:18, 22 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep I think it has at least some Google hits and 10 editors involved, and of course publications (military, federal register, technical manual, side mentions re use and history/radio buffs), so it seems reasonable to keep. It seems more activity than some other kinds of article such as astronomical (e.g. HD 44131), biological (e.g. Scarabaeus satyrus), or some technical terms. It would seem better to me to merge it, per the GNG guidance “it might be useful to discuss it within another article“ and have this as a section in a list article or table on the series of military radios, but that would require a wider judgement and work merging numerous articles. It just seems better presented by external overviews as Military Radios or Equipment listing. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 15:26, 22 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep We have large numbers of articles on military electronics of the United States and other countries. If anything their value is even greater today, with a major war ongoing in Europe and frequent stories in the press about different types of weapons being used and transferred. An argument could be made for merging many into a single article e.g. Military radios of the United states, or.some such, but that would be a major work project and have little benefit to Wikipedia. As for Category:Aircraft stations, this seems to be created as part of Category:Radio stations and systems ITU, which appears to be recapitulating the types of radio stations as defined under the UN's ITU regulations. I don't see the point in attempting to list all the aircraft radios in that category, it is the only ITU station type where this is being attempted. Indeed, I don't think the ARC-182 qualifies as an Aircraft station under the ITU definition. Rather it is one possible component of such a station which might be installed on a particular aircraft. I suggest Category:Aircraft stations be listed for deletion as misconceived.--agr (talk) 19:32, 22 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge to List of military electronics of the United States per WP:PRESERVE. WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS isn't a valid argument. The only non-primary source with (maybe) more than passing coverage I could find was [1]. The argument of the frequent stories in the media about different types of weapons being transferred to the Ukrainian military does not hold water either. Yes, specific weapon systems are under the spotlight due to their use in the war (HIMARS, Javelin, M777, and many others to a smaller scale). But not individual components. As far as I know, nobody made an article in the style of "The US is transferring the HIMARS to Ukraine, let's discuss the radio used by that system". As the nom wrote, the subject of this article fails WP:GNG, as do most if not all specific types of aircraft radios. But this one still is worth mentioning somewhere in my opinion. BilletsMauves€500 21:25, 22 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
BilletsMauves, Thanks for mentioning HIMARS and the like. A year ago they might have been considered by some to be too obscure to merit separate articles. Now they are featured in the nightly news. In online discussion, many more weapon systems from multiple countries are mentioned, often with links to their Wikipedia article. Our editors did not write all these articles in anticipation of war breaking out in Europe, rather from a desire to have complete coverage of the major systems used by the world's militaries. That is what an encyclopedia does. Aircraft radio systems are not minor components, but significantly affect the capabilities of military aviation, in terms of range, security, protection against jamming and interoperability with other services. I could easily see a story emerging about re-equipping Soviet era fighters with radios such as these, for example, or their use in small patrol boats. Whether we have one large article on, say U.S. military aircraft radios, or several smaller articles hardly matters.--agr (talk) 16:14, 26 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@ArnoldReinhold huh ? HIMARS, Javelin and others already passed GNG by a wide margin back then. Passing GNG does not necessarily have to do with coverage in mainstream media, far from it. That with "a story emerging about re-equipping Soviet era fighters with radios such as these" is irrelevant: we judge the subject's notability in its current state, and we don't try to predict what it will be in, say, six months. While I agree that radios are important systems on an aircraft, the question is whether or not this specific model passes WP:GNG. And it appears that it doesn't. That's all. BilletsMauves€500 20:27, 26 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
The argument "maybe this will become notable one day" just reinforces the problems with "it's not notable now", plus WP:CRYSTALBALL. And, uh, this is a 1970s tech that might be obsolete by now (the article does not suggest it is still used). Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 04:10, 27 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Update I found a couple of references using Wikipedia Library and another editor has added as well. To respond to earlier comments, there is no reason to assume the -182 is no longer in service anywhere. It was adopted by many countries and replacements like the ARC-210 are very expensive. Even the US faces budget constraints when replacing radios. And it has historical value in the progression of US capabilities. Wikipedia cover military weapon systems in great detail, without any crystal ball forecast of when or where our articles might be useful. Yet that coverage has proven valuable in the past. There is no reason why military aircraft communications systems should be any different, whether in multiple articles or combined into a single article.--agr (talk) 21:47, 30 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Currently split 2-2-2 for delete, keep, and merge.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, — Ceso femmuin mbolgaig mbung, mellohi! (投稿) 21:56, 30 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

mello, AFD is not a vote. Liz Read! Talk! 04:52, 2 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I know that, sorry for unclear phrasing that implies the contrary. I understand that merely getting the most votes does not make an option win, but I wanted to just succinctly state how split people are over here. I would not encourage closing based on just the amount of votes it has received. — Ceso femmuin mbolgaig mbung, mellohi! (投稿) 05:07, 2 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Sandstein 09:34, 7 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  • Keep References added recently (such as the Aviation Week story focusing on this particular technology) have shown enough notability for a standalone article. - LuckyLouie (talk) 17:56, 7 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment The current sourcing includes primary sources (refs #1, #6), a few passing mentions (refs #2, #3, #5), multiple refs to the unreliable globalsecurity website (ref #4, #9). These aren't enough to convince me to change my !vote above. I don't have access to #7 and #8, could @ArnoldReinhold: (I assume these are the ones you refer to above?) describe their depth of coverage? Based on the pulled quotes, they sound like they'd be passing mentions as well. -Ljleppan (talk) 18:56, 7 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    • AWST reference 7 discusses the ARC-182 among several programs. Reference 8 "Two New Jam-Resistant Sicgars Radios Readied for Flight Tests" is all about plans to upgrade the ARC-182 and one other radio to provide Sicgars frequency hopping capability, so discussion is significant. Also, I don't see why Globalsecurity, which largely references government sources, would be considered unreliable. There are a number of articles, similar to this one and it may make sense to cabin them into, say "United States military aircraft radios." I may take that on when I have a bit more time.--agr (talk) 17:29, 11 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Guerillero Parlez Moi 12:50, 15 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.