Okay, another follow-up: The maple I'm going to back the bow with is only about 1/8" thick and super bendy. Do I actually have to steam/boil in recurves on that strip and THEN apply it to the back of the bow, or can I just bend it to the form of the bow and glue it down without going through a separate steam-bending process?
In bending in the recurves I lifted some scary looking cracks. I clamped them down, so the bow is intact for the moment, but I'm thinking I should trap the belly-side of the tips with the same maple I'm using on the back, so this question will apply to both backing and belly-trapping on the tips.