waynepunkdude Posted October 31, 2008 Share Posted October 31, 2008 I know that the red clipping light on my Ampeg B2R is to let me know I have to much gain but I like the sound when I overdrive it, is it going to damage the amp? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Funk Posted October 31, 2008 Share Posted October 31, 2008 (edited) Read through this exchange and make up your own mind: [url="http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=30315"]http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=30315[/url] . In my opinion, no - except for when the speaker farts. Edited October 31, 2008 by The Funk Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waynepunkdude Posted October 31, 2008 Author Share Posted October 31, 2008 Hmmmm I have a limiter on my amp would that save the cab? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alexclaber Posted October 31, 2008 Share Posted October 31, 2008 Clipping can cause tweeters to be overpowered and thus damaged. It is unlikely to damage woofers unless your amp has a much higher power output than your speakers are rated or your are pushing the amp so hard that there are no dynamics and the tone is constantly overdriven andh heavily compressed. Pushing an amp into extreme clipping will not damage the amp - that's what guitar amps spend most of their lives doing! Alex Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waynepunkdude Posted October 31, 2008 Author Share Posted October 31, 2008 [quote name='alexclaber' post='318964' date='Oct 31 2008, 12:31 PM']Clipping can cause tweeters to be overpowered and thus damaged. It is unlikely to damage woofers unless your amp has a much higher power output than your speakers are rated or your are pushing the amp so hard that there are no dynamics and the tone is constantly overdriven andh heavily compressed. Pushing an amp into extreme clipping will not damage the amp - that's what guitar amps spend most of their lives doing! Alex[/quote] Should I just turn the tweeter off then? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dood Posted October 31, 2008 Share Posted October 31, 2008 I believe that in the manual of the valve preamp'd Ampegs it actually says that overdriving the *preamp* section will make the clip LED flicker , or in some extreme cases, stay on as you force the preamp into distortion. They say it is safe to do so. The clip LED on those models monitors the preamp section, not the power amp section. Your limiter on your amp should help to save your speakers if you are pushing the amp hard. (as long as your speakers have a suitable power rating too) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bass_ferret Posted October 31, 2008 Share Posted October 31, 2008 Use the Search facility and you will find [url="http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=29892&hl=clipping"]this[/url] and [url="http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=30228&hl=clipping"]this[/url] and even [url="http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=27636&hl=clipping"]this[/url]. Fair play to Alex for answering the same questions over and over again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Fitzmaurice Posted October 31, 2008 Share Posted October 31, 2008 [quote name='alexclaber' post='318964' date='Oct 31 2008, 08:31 AM']Clipping can cause tweeters to be overpowered and thus damaged. It is unlikely to damage woofers unless your amp has a much higher power output than your speakers are rated or your are pushing the amp so hard that there are no dynamics and the tone is constantly overdriven andh heavily compressed. Pushing an amp into extreme clipping will not damage the amp - that's what guitar amps spend most of their lives doing! Alex[/quote]+1. Guitar amps don't use clip lamps as they'd never be off. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alexclaber Posted October 31, 2008 Share Posted October 31, 2008 Sorry, I should have said power amp clipping, not merely clipping. Preamp clipping can still damage tweeters due to the increased HF energy but then so can overdrive, distortion and fuzz pedals. In practice you're pretty unlikely to have a problem. Turning down your tweeter will not help because that means the L-pad has to absorb the extra power and because you can't hear the increased HF if your tweeter is turned down then you could keep cranking the distortion until you burn out the L-pad. I'm always reading about people wanting high power amps to have headroom - the fact is that unless your rig is huge, you're using a lot of compression or you're in a very quiet band that no rig will have sufficient headroom to never clip. Uncompressed bass guitar is incredibly dynamic - the peak signal is far far louder than the average signal. If you have experience with digital multitrack recording you'll have noticed this because if you set all the inputs to never clip then when you come to playing back the full mix you'll find the fader for the bass guitar channel has to be way higher up then any of the other faders. If a power amp clip light is permanently on then you might have a problem but I would expect most amps' clip lights to flicker throughout a gig. Alex Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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