Talk:Optical landing system

Good start
Nick, thanks for getting this started, as it's a topic that hasn't been covered in deatil here as yet. I'd recommend considering moving it to a slighty-broader title, something like carrier landing systems, and covering the modern methods of carrier approach and landing on supercarriers and the VSTOL/amphib carriers. - BillCJ (talk) 16:37, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks Bill. I made this basically as a place holder and intend to considerably expand it with references etc when I get the time.  I just felt we needed an article for this subject so I made one. Nick Thorne  talk  00:45, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

Hello. I liked what you wrote and stole it to Optical Landing System. Still needs work, but what do you think? E2a2j (talk) 19:50, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

UK/US centric view
Hi! Nice work but: Mirror Landing Aid was not the first OLS. In 1932 Japanese developed chakkan shidoto (着艦指導灯) which was in use since 1933/34 until the end of WWII. For example viz Japanese Carier Operation --Sceadugenga (talk) 19:18, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

Light definitions
I saw on an image htat there were "cut lights", "datum lights", "wave-off lights", and "emergency wave-off lights". What does all that mean? 71.40.68.66 (talk) 20:35, 19 February 2010 (UTC)


 * Fair enough, added a section describing them. Nick Thorne  talk  05:11, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

Expanded lead
I added a few sentences to the lead, which previously only discussed how landings were done before the OLS. There's a short summary of when it was introduced, what the lights are, and who is responsible for the system. In order to avoid making the lead too long I only mentioned deployment on U.S. carriers and included only the basics of the lights. The article goes on to discuss its British origins. I kept it to a single paragraph although the entirety of the new text would also work as a second paragraph. Roches (talk) 00:32, 2 September 2015 (UTC)

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Is "the ball" somewhere in the diagram of the OLS?
The intro to this article asserts that "ball" refers informally to the OLS as a whole. However, the Components > Lights section suggests that Ball refers to a subsidiary feature of the OLS. There's a nice diagram ("Diagram showing parts of OLS") showing all the parts of the OLS mentioned in this section, except for the Ball. Does the Ball in fact appear in the diagram, and if so, where?

If I had to guess, I'm thinking that the Ball is the red light in the middle of the vertical bar of mostly yellow lights?

Though this diagram doesn't really agree with the subsequent "Comparison of PAPI, VAS and OLS", where no vertical bar appears, and the light showing too high/low is mostly yellow.

Then there's also two red lights at the bottom of that vertical bar. What are those for? Gwideman (talk) 04:49, 11 July 2024 (UTC)