Jammed cartridge or broken film counter?

[chrisgavin]

So I was out shooting today with my Nizo 156XL down at my local top secret nuclear bunker...

The first film (Argenti BW neg) went through the camera fine and the film 'end' is showing in the cartridge indicating that it is all shot. I put the second cartridge in, (the footage counter reset OK) then I continued shooting.
I shot quite a lot more before I noticed that the footage counter hadn't moved.

I opened the film door, all looked OK, I checked the claw is still working and tugged on the film a little bit from the cartridge.
Then I shot some more, but again the film counter hasn't move at all from the '50 foot remaining' position.

So now, I'm very unsure if I've really shot anything at all on this second cart. Although I guess I've shot about 20 feet, I've no way of knowing for sure.
I'm somewhat in limbo, not knowing if the stuff I've shot is safe and whether to carry on shooting with this cartridge;
a slightly inconclusive end to today's adventure : (

Up until now, this camera has worked well and the footage counter has been working fine too.
Anyone on here had that happen and can offer some advice please?
Many thanks,
Chris

[granfer]

Easy way to check if cartridge is jammed....... remove from camera, pull out a little film from top (like you did before), wind it in by hand. Then mark the film at the top of the cartridge aperture with a felt tip pen (let it dry!), replace in camera and shoot a half second burst.
Remove cartridge again. Has the mark moved?

[chrisgavin]

granfer,

Many thanks. A simple idea, but very effective...

I marked the film and ran the camera and saw that the film hadn't moved.

I looked again at the cartridge and there was sprocket damage or at least a scratch along the line of the sprocket holes. This looks to me like the film wasn't moving but the claw has been scraping across the stationary film. I then removed the cartridge and pulled out a small loop and tried the 'turning by hand test' and I felt there was some resistance, but then this gave way and I could twist the loop back into the cart.
I then did the 'mark the film' test you've suggested a couple more times and the film does now seem to be moving along under power from the camera.

So this evidence all points to a film jam, and if the footage counter is correct, this probably happened from the point when I first tried to use this cartridge.
The camera seems to be running now, but I'm guessing I wont have some of the shots I'd hoped I'd got.
But I'm hoping the camera is OK and that I've still got 50 feet of film to use next time.

Thanks again for your help.

[granfer]

My pleasure!