Cheaper is a relative term. A salt pot and an oven are both costly items. A commercial salt pot is more expensive than a commercial oven. In use and maintenance the oven wins hands down as being easier and cheaper.
If by "carbuzation", you meant de-carburization, that is not much of a problem for most simple steels. A coating of PBC or Turco will protect the steel surface, and a properly tuned forge atmosphere ( one that is neutral or very slightly reducing) will assure that the blade does not get de-carburized. Putting a chunk of wood in the forge does nothing much, but such things persist. If there is free oxygen in the forge atmosphere, it will bond with the 1500F steel as well as the wood. For higher temperatures, and longer soaks,as required with stainless steels, wrapping the steel in a stainless foil packet is the norm. This excludes all external oxygen from the blade. Some put in a small piece of paper to burn up the trapped oxygen in the packet, but this is also serves no real purpose. Most of these steels are air quenching, and a pair thick ( 1" or more) aluminum plates do an excellent job of both cooling and preventing warp. Aluminum isn't a fast enough quench for oil and water quench steels. If an oil quench steel is done in a stainless packet, just snip the end ( while holding the packet in a pair of tongs, take the blade out with another pair of tongs ( or cheap HF long nose pliers) and quench in oil. There is no need to rush, as all the steels that you would possible do this on are deep hardening and you have from over 10 seconds to a couple minutes to get the quench done before the steel would hit the pearlite nose.
Stacy
