Plane brass?

[Bill Perkins]

I came across an old article on Duckers wherein the author mentioned a nice detail . The craft in question had half oval brass rub rails and these had been reduced approaching each of their ends by "planeing " the backside . This tapered the piece in thickness and width at the same time . Has anyone out there planed brass ,as with a hand plane ?
The writer may have gotten it wrong .There were machine shops in Philly that could have milled such a thing back in the Duckers heyday . The side of a big grindstone would work , or a determined person with a big file could have done it too . Today you could get close with a belt sander . Still , I’m curious to know if you can plane brass half oval -but I hesitate to try it with my own planes .

[Tylerdurden]

the process is very similar to hand scraping,

http://www.machinerepair.com/

It is an art and having done some scraping to restore machine tools I can tell you it takes patience. The belt sander would work with some polishing afterwards. I am good with a 4" grinder so I might try it with that and a tiger disc.

[plyboat]

I use a stationary sander or grinder for the rough shaping, 80 grit and a palm sander, then 150 grit, then 220 grit and then purple scotch bright on the entire piece for a nice burnished finish. Each end takes no more than 5 minutes for narrow stock.
---Joel---

[George Ray]

Tool steel is well suited for cutting most brasses and in small stock and small cutter sizes, human power would be appropriate. The cutting angle and fine edge of block or bench plane is not ideal but it you easily machine brass by hand.