Amp hookup question

[jayK]

I've got a few small practice amps at home, and was wondering if you could plug in a smaller amp to the bigger amp to make it louder by using the headphone out on the smaller one and plugging that into the guitar port on the bigger one.

I'm sorry if this sounds totally stupid, I am electronically challenged and pretty new to the technical aspects of amplification. I pretty much know how to plug an amp into the wall and plug in my guitar, beyond that it's pretty sketchy!

 

[Quencho092]

Re: Amp hookup question

nope, you'll just be stacking two preamps on eachother.

If you had a way to split your guitar signal (AB box) you could play all your amps at the same time. This would give you a pretty sweet stereo effect.

 

[Scott_F]

Re: Amp hookup question

ABY switches are about $40. That is the preferred way to do it. Guitar into ABY, ABY will have two wires coming off of it, plug one into the input on each amp.

On a lot of smaller amps, if you plug into the headphone jack, the internal speaker of that amp goes silent. This is great when one wants to crank it up at midnight and you don't want to wake the neighbors.

Some amps give you a choice to mute that internal speaker when you go into the headphone jack. Some don't. An amp should always have a speaker hooked up to it when you are running it. In the case where the amp maker has given you a headphone option and such, go with what their manual says.

If yours does, you will then be driving your bigger amp with the tone of the smaller amp. Quencho is correct that you'll be driving one preamp into another. There is nothing wrong with that. You'll just have to dial in the tone on the bigger amp once you get the smaller one set.

You would never want to hook a speaker out of one amp into the input of another amp. that doesn't work well. But, a line out or a headphone jack, that's fine. If your line out or headphone jack has an independent level (volume) control, then adjust it down fairly low so you don't overwhelm the bigger amp.

Good luck with the tone, but I don't think you'll hurt anything.

Much better to buy the ABY switch and an extra cable and you'll be able to maximize the tone out of each amp.

 

[The Golden Boy]

Re: Amp hookup question

Or using send and return loops, if they're on your amps.

 

[Mephis]

Re: Amp hookup question

So, could I basicly use 1 amp as a preverbial "foot pedal" distortion box to drive another amp?

For instance, if one amp isnt cranking enough gain, could I run the headphone jack into the guitar input? I don't wana blow nothin up, lol.