Alright, a counterpoint. French bike differences are *not* difficult to deal with. The biggest difficulty is figuring out what threads and tubing sizes the bike has, and that, frankly, is not really that hard, is it? Once you know what the bike requires it is not hard to find bottom brackets (sealed or cup and cone), seat posts, headsets, and stems. The parts will be of good quality too.

As for the “death stem,” check any stem (AVA or otherwise) to see if there are any cracks at the top of the slit that allows the base of the stem to expand when the binder bolt is tightened. Any stem that uses vertical slots can crack there. The issue with AVA stems is that they has two slots, making the chances of failure much worse.