One reason you don't see many long French stems is the way the old French frames were designed. In the late 60's/ early 70's it was typical for a 54 cm French frame (my size) to have a 56 cm, or quite often even a 57 cm top tube. I have several French frames like this, and am always looking for 70mm or even 60 mm stems to make them work for me. As to bars, road bars (as opposed to randonneur bars) were usually 38 cm then, rarely more than 40 cm, regardless of nationality. One great replacement for the old AVA bars is the Belleri 16D, which Sheldon Brown sells. Unmarked like the AVA and virtualy indistinguishable except for the fact that the Belleri is not cracked and does not show that odd "droop" down from the stem that marked a damaged AVA. Sheldon also lists these as 41.5 cm wide, a bit more generous than the old AVA's.
Regards,
Jerry "Francophile" Moos
Houston, TX
> I'm looking for parts for the 59cm 1963 Peugeot PX-10 I've mentioned here
> before.
>
> http://www.birfield.com/
>
> I'm 6'2", usually ride a 60cm c-c road bike, and prefer a 135mm stem or so
> on top of a 59cm top tube, with 44cm c-c or wider bars. Of course, that's
> on a modern bike.
>
> While trolling ebay for older French bars and stems I see 9cm and 7cm
> stems, 39cm and 40cm bars. It doesn't look like longer stems and wider
bars
> were made/sold/used before 1970? Am I wrong?
>
> What sort of size ranges were available back in the 1960s?
>
> I've read recently that AVA should be avoided. (I'm also 240lbs (and
> dropping) and I ride hard and break stuff.) What bar/stem would you
> recommend for me and this frameset, that's roughly period-correct? I plan
> to ride it.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Morgan Fletcher
> Oakland, CA