Battery issue(s)

Where to begin...About 3 days ago I blew the fuse for my nak amp.(during these three days my system was never on). So today I decided to upgrade the fuse holder from the spade fuse holder to the supplied agu holder that came with the amp. No big task, cut some wires, strip 'em and screw into the metal ends. I finished that no problem, re-attach the stupid stinger bat. terminal that has a few outputs for cables. That didn't want to go on, and had to be forced on due to the bat. terminal being too large in diameter for the distro block.

Anyway the damn car won't start, it won't even crank over, it just clicks! Get my dmm, standing voltage of the battery is 10.4. How could that happen all of the sudden? I walked away from the situation for a while. Came back and the bat. snuck up to 11.8 volts. wtf! still no go on the car. Why did this happen so rapidly?

After giving up on my bat, I go to kragen get a bat. but it's too f***ing big for the stock bat. clamp, they closed about an hour ago...

When you say to big for the stock battery clamp, did you mean the battery holder to keep the battery in place? (sorry, I'm Australian and we have different names for everything) or did you mean one of the battery terminals? if you can get the terminals on, will the car start?

When you replaced the fuse holder, you didn't accidentally short it out did you? High current shorts can blow a hole in the battery plates milling your voltage pretty quickly and destroying the battery. if this is the case then the reason it rose up by nearly 1.5 volts is whats called a surface charge, even if that surface sharge was 12.4 it still wouldn't start your car as it won't hold any current.

Well today I went elsewhere and purchased the same battery as the dead one, so that there would be no problems with it fitting my vehicle.  Yes overworked2,  I was reffering to the batt. holder on the car, however when I bought the stinger cable distro. block it was the neg version, hence it not ever fitting properly on the pos. terminal of the batt but I also took care of that today with the proper + distro block. (more $)

As far as the battery going dead, I am going to attribute that to a few things. 1. I need a high output alternator plain and simple 2. the battery is old 3. I pounded the distro block on the pos terminal with a rubber mallet (very stupid, it was a sign of frustration and impatience)

thank you for that explanation of the surface charge and on shorting the battery.