Ender 3 - constant ticking of extruder

Hello,
I have some trouble with my Ender 3 V1. I've had it for 3 years now and yesterday I took the hotend apart because it stopped extruding. The bowden wasn't flush with the nozzle and filament was leaking around the heat-stop. I cleaned it as I could gently scrubing the threads with a small screwdriver. Then I screwed in a brand new nozzle but didn't tighten it until I pushed the bowden snug to the nozzle. I also cut the end of the bowden because it was slightly damaged but cuttinng deformed it so I lightly squeezed it the other way to make it circular again. The printer worked fine for the first calibration cube I did but immediately afterwards it started ticking again. The print quality seems OK at the moment but the extruder stepper keeps on ticking regardless. All parts apart from the nozzle are stock, I'm using PLA and printing at 210C and 50mm/s at 0.12mm layer height. Any help on the topic would be apreciated.
Thank you,
Burek

suggestions....... Check extruder gears for clogging with filament fragments, clean if required.............. When changing nozzles, heat the heater block to 10 degrees above normal operating temp before finally tightening the nozzle in............. Important to have a good 90 degree cut on the end of the bowden tube were it butts up to nozzle...........