I assume that you understand that you can clean your barrel in a HORIZONTAL position with water and soap patches, provided that you put the barrel on a rest with the top of the barrel DOWN, and the stock UP. I do this when cleaning my gun at the kitchen sink. This protects the stock finish from being damaged by having BP crud drip down on the stock.
I do plug the TH, or nipple socket, and pour soap and liquid soap( a few drops) down the barrel to help dissolve and emulsify the carbon residue, and unburned grease and oil in the barrel.
I stand the gun upright on its butt, leaning against the counter top and a drawer, partly pulled out to prevent the gun from sliding off the counter top edge. I clean the lock, and I stow other gear while letting the barrel soak.
Then I pour out the crud, work the bore over with a bore brush to get into the corners of the grooves, then flush that crud out, when I rinse the soap and crud out of the barrel.
Use some kind of pouring cup to carefully pour the water down the barrel for rinsing. I wrap a towel around the muzzle to catch any water than might spill over.
Then the gun goes UPSIDE DOWN on my dish strainer, which is tipped slightly toward the sink. That insures that any wet in the bore goes into the sink, and not back down on my stock. I use VERY WET cleaning patches, with soap added to them, to clean the bore better in this horizontal position, if I see any evidence of dark black streaks on my cleaning patches when they come back out of the bore.
I read the patches, and Have, on more than one occasion, had to go back to using some water in the bore, and my bronze bore brush to scrub out the remaining crud caught in the corners of the grooves. ( Didn't give the soap and water enough time to sit and do their job :shocked2: :nono: :idunno: :surrender: :bow: :grin: ).
I Lift the muzzle up when putting a sloppy wet patch on my cleaning jag down the barrel, and then lower the muzzle so that any water will flow back out the muzzle into the sink.
I run wet patches into the barrel until I see them coming out clean. Then, I run dry patches until they also come out clean. Then, the barrel gets a light coat of oil for storage.
NO WATER, SOAP or crud gets on the wood of my stock, unless I forget and grab the stock with a wet hand! :blah: :nono: :shocked2:
Remember to wipe off any residue on the barrel, both near the muzzle, and back at the nipple, or TH in a flintlock. I wipe down the entire barrel and stock, just assuming that at some time during shooting, I have managed to get residue on all of the gun. I use a wax/oil mix to protect the barrel, and other metal parts during storage- only because the wax seems to hold the oil to the metal better, and longer, than a simply coating of oil alone.
I hope this helps. You can buy or make a "gun cleaning " rack if you insist, to help hold the gun horizontal and upside down on your counter top for these purposes. I have found no need for doing so.
I remove the nipples on my guns every time I clean, so that I can clean them separately. I use a toothbrush to crub the cooked on crud off the stainless steel nipples, soak them in a glass of water with a drop of soap in it, to clean the insides of the nipples, and use that brush to clean the thread. Then they are dried, visually inspected by holding the nipple up to the light, and looking through them. If needed, I run a wire down the nipple to knock out any debris, and to measure the diameter of the hole in the nipple to check for wear.
When I finish with the barrel(s), I dry the threaded holes in the bolster, running a pipe cleaner down the flash channel to first dry it, and then oil it lightly, and apply a drop of oil to both those threads and to the threads on the nipples, and screw the two together manually. When I hit bottom, I THEN use my nipple wrench to firmly tighten, but not crush, the nipples into place. "Firmly tighten" means that you tighten the nipples down so they can't be turned out by using your fingers, but not so tight that you have to draft a friend to hold the gun while you try to turn the nipple out with your nipple wrench! :shocked2: :nono: :hmm: :hatsoff: