Can someone help me understand?

[scatterlight]

I have a small 25w bassman amp I play a De Armond with active pickups through. Recently I acquired a Mesa V twin preamp for my Telecaster. The other day I hooked it up to the bass and it sounded superb. But I did, however, notice a Ticking noise coming from the bass amp especially if I slapped . Not very loud the clicking, but click click nevertheless. It is consistent with both channels. As far as the connection is concerned, I think I have it right. I get a beautiful tone.

 

Now, am I wrong in assuming that as the Mesa is a "Pre" amp it does not have the ability to overwhelm any amp in terms of a load, as it does not have a output rating.

Is this sort of sound what is commonly referred to as clipping?

 

As you might have figured out by now, I'm a rank armature in the gear dept. Any input will be much appreciated.

[Perfessor]

The clipping I've experienced is a garbled sound the comes and goes.

 

The clicking sound is probably the frets and/or strings hitting the pickups and the preamp amplifies these sounds better. It is, after all, a guitar preamp.

[scatterlight]

Thank you. so theoretically, and in all situations, when when dealing with a preamp (alone) I don't need to worry about overloading the speaker, is this correct? The sound however is pretty uniform and tend to get marginally louder when I mute the string by hand. It is a little glassy/mechanical in quality.

Going back to the preamp, does the fact that the pre has a high gain capacity affect the peak signal threshold of the speaker?

Once again thanks a lot for the help.

[Rowka]

It can still overload the input stage of your bassman.

[Kaesh]

You can make any combination of equipment blow up if you're gifted enough. Try hooking the preamp to the effects return jack instead of the input on the bassman.

[scatterlight]

Thanks Kaesh. I will try that now.