Henry: No way to tell 100 % but... if ya cock it, ya can put a straight edge on the diss bars one at a time, look for a belly in middle under straight edge. You also check limbs for splinters or cracks. I seriously doubt anyone would sell you a defective bow[splinters or cracks] and bent bars are not critical and very hard to detect by just eyeballing them. Fwiw: in the event of a dryfire, your limbs are less likely to be damaged w/ excel string than w/ fff. If the diss bars are bent a tad, just unstring bow, take them off and beat em flat! Ain't it great being your own pro shop? LOL