Hey Scientists, science question

[Nephew Twiddleton]

How do you directly measure carbon output from a combustible source?

Twid,
Twidsister needs a science project, Twid has a lump of turf from Ireland

[The Good Reverend Roger]

How do you directly measure carbon output from a combustible source?

Light him on fire.  Hold cloth over fire.  Then feed a scrap of the cloth through a Horiba or other light-scattering instrument, and get the particle size and average density.  Then divide density by size. 

Tell the police that he was on fire when you got there.

[Nephew Twiddleton]

How do you directly measure carbon output from a combustible source?

Light him on fire.  Hold cloth over fire.  Then feed a scrap of the cloth through a Horiba or other light-scattering instrument, and get the particle size and average density.  Then divide density by size. 

Tell the police that he was on fire when you got there.

I'm going to send that to Twidsister.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

How do you directly measure carbon output from a combustible source?

Light him on fire.  Hold cloth over fire.  Then feed a scrap of the cloth through a Horiba or other light-scattering instrument, and get the particle size and average density.  Then divide density by size. 

Tell the police that he was on fire when you got there.

[Forsooth]

How do you directly measure carbon output from a combustible source?

Twid,
Twidsister needs a science project, Twid has a lump of turf from Ireland

without already having one or blowing hundreds of moneys on a sensor/detector,

-measure mass, burn, measure remaining mass
doesn't differentiate between the non-carbon products, pyrolysis, etc., but you could explain that with other sciencing

[Faust]

In general? Optically.

If you have some kind of some stack you probably need one of those ceramic electrochemical sensors, the chemistry of which is voodoo to me, it probably has something that reacts with the carbon that gives out a weak electrical signal that is proportional to the density.

[Nephew Twiddleton]

Twidsister opted to go with a different idea. However i might like to try this myself anyway.