I hear you Marc. I became aware of the same rumors after I had backed the bow, but I could not find any reports where the rumor was substantiated. What I can say is that I modeled this bow closely after a bow that was reportedly constructed by Steve Alley. The bow was broken so I was able to deconstruct it and saw that the sinew was affixed to a thinned layer of sapwood. So I just did the same without thinking about it much.
In retrospect I might not make the same decision today. As for this bow we shall see what happens. If the backing holds, great; if not, then I will let everyone on this forum know and we’ll have learned something useful.