1.8 clipper not starting

Was running fine the other day, did a couple of little jobs on it, changed the interior light for a new one, checked the oil pressure switch above the oil filter to investigate an oil leak, and put the battery + terminal on properly as it was not on tight enough.

About three hours passed and I looked out the kitchen window and noticed the stereo lights were on, it must have turned itself on when I reconnected the battery, so I went and turned it off.
I have tried to start the car since and it will not go. I have hooked up some jump leads as I thought the stereo being on may have sapped some battery power, although it is a new battery and the stereo was only on demo mode and not playing, but still nothing.

it does turn over, and if I put my foot on the throttle it sounds like it wants to go but just will not fire up.
It was in for mot a week or two ago, and the carb was adjusted as it had failed on emissions.
The carb is weber 32/34dmtl, and was replaced less than a thousand miles ago, along with the fuel pump, swirl pot, and various different fuel and vacuum hoses, and a new fuel filler neck

The car was making an odd noise the other day, like the sound of a bad earth through the stereo, even when the stereo was turned off. The earth strap from the NSF wing to the bonnet had snap, so I replaced it and the noise has dissappeared.
The garage that mot it also put a new fuel filter on. It is much larger than the ones I normally put on, and not tapered towards the outlet, leaving a very large lip for the fuel to get over to flow down the fuel hose. It  looked as if there was not enough fuel in the filter for it to be able to do this, so I changed it for a smaller diameter filter that is tapered towards the outlet. This is now full of fuel. I also took the air box off and poured a thimbles worth of fuel in the carb, but again this made no difference.

Sorry about the essay, but wanted to try give as much info as I can remember. Any ideas?

charge the battery up and try again, it maybe there isnt enough power for it to crank and also power the coil. may also be that the battery is duff, a dead one can drain the power from the donor car even when you jump start!

I have a couple of chargers, a cheapo one with a red light and a green light that is supposed to come on when the battery is charged and one that my dad gave me with a gauge that reads min to max, which he suspected was knackered.

I left the battery on charge for a couple of hours this morning on my cheap charger, then tried the other charger and it read half way between min and max, but if left on this charger the gauge starts to drop towards the min, so left on charge for a couple of hours on the cheap one, testing it on the other charger every now and then just to check if the gauge is going up but it will not get beyond half way.

Does this sound like a duff battery or does it need significantly longer?

I've tried it on the car again and if I leave the key turned for what feels like a couple of minutes and rest my foot slightly on the throttle with the choke out it does seem to turn over a bit quicker but just doesn't want to fire up!

if it wont go past half that would suggest its duff assuming the chargers are working ok anyway. try jumping it with your old battery disconnected, if it cranks over great and fires then you know you need a new battery. could try leaving it on charge overnight

The chargers are shyte, they do charge (or at least one of them does) but they don't tell me when they are fully charged.
Luckily there is a motorcycle garage not 50 yards from my house, so I walked up and asked them to test the battery, and it was fully charged.

I have taken out a couple of the plugs, and they are wet so there is obviously fuel getting to them, but when I got the missus to crank the car over while holding a couple of the plugs against the engine block there was no spark coming from either of the plugs that I checked.

I have checked all the fuses and they are all fine.

alrighty then, look at the coil, dizzy, tcu/spark control unit and the wiring between it all. make sure you have 12v at the coil both with ignition and cranking.

oh, and dont hold the sparkplug next time, you'll get a good jolt. rest it on the engine instead and stand back

Thanks.
Is the spark control unit the ting mounted on bulkhead near the coil?

Don't worry, I held the plugs to the block with insulated pliers, I am not a complete numpty  

its in the scuttle area, 7 pin jobber

once you get a jolt off a spark plug you never do it again

Meh.

Feckin stereo.

Thought, just on the off chance, I try unplugging the stereo and try start it.

Fired up like there had never been a problem.

Its not even as if the wiring was butchered, all proper block connectors, but one of the blanked off live wires from the head unit must have got caught between the unit and the cage, as when I pulled it out I could see it short, and it has blown the fuse for the stereo, clock and interior light, speaking of which, my fuse box has no cover (if its even meant to have one like a mk2 has?) so can anyone enlighten me which fuse it is before I pull them all out! lol

its just a cardboard panel thing on a mk1, have a look at the fusebox sticky for the fuse layout