@teejcee
I'm 99% sure that you problems with reaching COPS with http
s have nothing to do with COPS.
Every webserver has a sort of "welcome" page like:
Code:
It works!
This is the default web page for this server.
The web server software is running but no content has been added, yet.
Can you reach (using a browser like Firefox) this page with:
1 - http://<your-LAN-IP-of your -server>
2 - https://<your-LAN-IP-of your -server>
1 should work
if 2 should work can you reach COPS with https://<your-LAN-IP-of your -server>/cops/index.php ?
If 2 does not work, then you should setup https on your web server.
[I did a quick setup of https on my apache webserver on a Pi and it works (after a restart or 2) with firefox. Later I will post the steps I needed to take here, bud now for something completely different ....... dinner 
]
However, bad or actually good luck, iOS does not accept self signed (ssl) certificates. So the only way to make COPS with https work is to buy a genuine ssl certificate (I'm not going to do that).
If I want an as secure as possible connection I will use openVPN not https.
What webserver are you using?
Good luck!
