First off, I'll say I'm not a bowyer by any stretch of the imagination. The closest I've come to making a bow was stringing up some hickory saplings with trotline when I was a kid. I have/do pester the snot out of bowyers with questions though, and try to find out as much as I can.

How much difference the wood makes (in a glass bow) depends on several things--the design, draw length vs. bow length, draw weight, how that weight is attained, and probably a few other things I can't think of at the moment.

First, the design. A bow with wide, thin limbs (as is common in recurves)generally doesn't have much wood there to begin with. A couple of strips of wood that are 1/16" of an inch thick don't offer much resistance--bend an old wooden yardstick and see how hard it is. The length of the working limb also makes a difference--take that same yardstick and grab it at one end and the half-way point and notice how much the resistance goes up. You can have a long bow with a short working limb, or a short bow with a long working limb, etc. Then you have bows, such as a Hill style longbow, that has a much narrower and deeper cored limb. With these, there is a lot more wood there and it does a lot more work--these bows generally are longer over-all and have a longer working limb--the wood offers too much resistance in a short limb with a deep core.

Draw length and bow length are in-line with the length of the working limb. A shorter draw or a longer working limbwon't stress the wood as much. If you are approaching the max draw lengthwithin a certain design/length, the wood can make a difference--some woods are more flexible, and will allow a smoother draw at a longer draw length; but this is only going to make a difference when you reach that point--this is where yew works better than most limb materials.

The draw weight, and how that weight is attained, can also make a difference. If the weight is attained by adding more wood, then the same thing is going to apply as with a deeper cored limb. However, if a thicker glass is used, it won't matter as much--the glass is doing most of the work.

Don't take all this as the gospel truth, because I'm going on what I've gathered from others over the years, and I could be wrong in some aspects, and I'm sure I've left some things out--I'm still learning. I do know that in most cases with Chek-Mate recurves, I'd pick the wood I liked the looks of best. Now, if a different bowyer or dealer tells you that this or that works best in their bows, I'd go with their recommendation--they should know their bows better than anyone else. Like most everything else in this sport, there are no absolutes that will cover every bow or every design.

Chad