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I made a simple LC Tank circuit which oscillates at 166 kHz. Looking at it using my oscilloscope I can see one cycle of the sine wave takes about 6 microseconds.

Now if I stick and antenna to this I should be ale to emit electromagnetic waves at 166 kHz frequency which has a wavelength of about 1.8 kilometres!

How can we have such a long wavelength if one cycle of this oscillation is only 6 microseconds? it doesn't make sense to me. Do the EM waves not get generated in the same speed as the oscillation in the antenna?

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Light travels quickly, that's all. In 6 $\mu$s, light travels $1.8$ km, so by the time you've finished one cycle, that's how far the radiation emitted during the start of that cycle has propagated.

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  • $\begingroup$ ah that makes sense. $\endgroup$
    – Dan
    Commented Jan 24 at 14:23

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