Ericv

I am pieceing together a new bike.

I have two separate questions re: Road Stems

1. What is the correct size stem for a short guy (5'4"). I'm pretty evenly proportioned. 90mm?, 100mm?, 110mm?. Help!

2. I was given a free stem by a friend (a Deda Newton 31) but I bought Winwood Carbon handlebars with the finger and thumb grooves. This would be considered oversize yes? Does this stem work for that?. It doesn't seem like it from the general test I did which was to remove the 4 clamp faceplate and wrapped the stem around the center of the bars and screwed the plate back on. There seemed to be space left between the clamp and the rest of the stem body.

Thank you in advance for anyone who responds to my thread.

Eric

AndrewP

If the distance from the nose of the saddle to the bars matches the forearm length from elbow to finger tip + width across knuckles, the stem length is about right.
There is supposed to be a small gap between the clamp and stem, so the bolts can put the squeezing force on the bar. The bar is too big for the stem, if it wont fit into the half hole across the front of the stem.
Unless you are an experienced racer, I suggest that you set the bar height level with your seat. This will probably mean putting the stem on the forks angled upwards, and also using some spacers between the stem and headset bearings. It may not look so cool when you park your bike at the bistro, but will give you a lot more satisfactin while riding.

Ericv

Thank you Andrew. Another question. The Bars I bought (Winwood Road Scholar) say they are 31.8 MM and the Deda Newton stem says 31.77mm.

does this mean the stem is just sightly too small?

Little Darwin

I wouldn't worry about .03 mm The deviation due to manufacturing is probably more than that.

Ericv

Thanks Andrew and Little Darwin for your experise.