I also just bought a Lyman Great Plains rifle. It reccomend to use soapy water to clean. I really feel uneasy about dumping water down the barrell of a gun!! Is there an alternative? Arent the solvents for black powder also water based? Also it does not look like you remove the breech plug to clean, or at least it says your not supposed to. How can you get down into it to dry it off? It seems like it could rust easy. Ant tips to clean the traditional type black poeder guns would help. Thanks

I'm no expert, but when I had a caplock, the way I cleaned it was to remove the barrel from the stock and stick the breech end into a pail of HOT soapy water. Scrub around the nipple area with an old toothbrush. I then ran a patch down on a cleaning jag and "pumped" the water up and down the barrel through the nipple. It cleaned the black powder out in no time.
Then, I took the barrel out of the pail, and poured REALLY HOT water into the muzzle, holding the barrel with a heavy rubber glove. The water will run out the nipple and the barrel will get real hot.
When the water's all out, I run a couple of clean patches down to get any water out near the breechplug, and give it a couple of minutes for any remaining vapor to evaporate. Then run whatever rust preventative/oil you like to use down on a patch. It also is a good idea to remove the nipple and clean inside it real well with pipe cleaners - as well as the passage that goes from nipple to breech.
Obviously, you also clean carefully around the lock andtrigger before coating with your favorite oil for storage.

IM jaybe

jaybe covered the subject of the water bath real well. I personally like HOT water with a little Dawn Dish Soap. That really seems to pull the fowling out of the barrel.

Somethings I do, especially on new rifles is after the water bath, I want to run a good cleaner down the bore and make sure there is no packing grease or excessive anything. A real good cleaner I found is called Simple Green. You mix it with water depending on the strength you want it. It is a great cleaner.

Some good black powder solvents are Butch's Bore Shine for Black Powder, and Birchwood Casey #77. Also Black Off - Rusty Duck work real good on black powder fowling.

After I am sure the bore of the rifle is clean, I like to put some isopropyl alcohol on a patch and run that down the barrel. That will help remove any mositure in the barrel. Then I dry patch it until the patches come out clean and dry. After that I oil my bore with Birchwood Casey Sheath which I was told is now under a new name which I forget.

Be sure and scrub the bolster area real well. And take some Q-tips and clean the hammer nose real good. If you fail to do that they will rust up in there and then sooner or later the hammer will rot away on you. Pipe cleaners in the nipple port will make sure the snail is open and clean and dry.

Every once in a while take a .22 caliber cleaning rod with a bore brush on it. Wrap a patch in to the wire brush and saturate the patch with good solvent. Then reach down in there and clean the base of the breech out. They also make bore scrapers for that too...

Water-flushing (or) a few ounces of harsh solvent poured down the muzzle using a funnelare the only ways to assure that the powder channel(s) in your bore remain open after extensive use of the ML. I do not use the bucket treatment -- instead use a short garden hose attached to my laundry tub faucet -- then install a garden hose gun on the end & shoot hard thrusts of very warm (but not real hot) water in the muzzle-end - with the muzzle pointed upwards.

Yes... it splashes a little - but it's only water. Plus, by that time, I already semi-cleaned the bore with several solvent patches. Always remove the nipple first before doing any power-flushing by bucket or or garden gun treatments. Q-tips and solvent-dipped pipe cleaners also help in making the nipple hole-area sparkling clean. I then apply a small amount of anti-seize to the nipple threads before installing it. Make sure no anti-seize gets near the bottom ignition hole of the nipple.

There are a number of solvents on the market that provide an alternative to putting water into your barrel. Unfortunately, NONE of them provide a better method of getting black powder or black powder substitute fouling out of a barrel.

I have found that the best and fastest way of cleaning a barrel that has some sort of a cleanout screw at the breech ( even if it is just removing the nipple) is to pour two quarts of boiling water through the barrel from the muzzle using a funnel and wrapping a towel around the barrel to provide a handle to allow you to hold it steady while pouring and preventing you from burning your hand.

As soon as the water has drained out, the barrel will be hotter than a two-dollar pistol, and you next swab it out with three or four clean, dry patches. When done swabbing, your bore will be both totally clean and very dry, in addition to being hot!

Let the barrel cool. Then swab the bore really well with a patch saturated with Birchwood-Casey Sheath (Barrier, I believe they call it now??).

Your bore is now clean and fully protected from rust & corrosion, AND, since the Sheath fills the pores of the metal and then dries completely, the next time you go to the range, you can load up and fire without having to swab out oil/grease before loading!

Water is the BEST solvent for black powder fouling, and for the salts from corrosive primers in old military smokeless powderammunition.

Thanks for the information on cleaning. I took the gun to the range and am very pleased to say the least. I was just shooting at 50 yards but it shoots a real tight pattern. The gun has a real nice feel to it and barely kicks do to the weight. Now I better start practicing off hand to get ready for my muley hunt in october!