Bushing for new water main?

I purchased my ranch in July of 2010. In October I noticed some standing water on the lawn when it hadn't rained for a while. I figured it was a hole in the water main. So I dug about a 5 foot trench down the length of the pipe to find the hole and patch it. Upon reaching the main I found that there were already 3 patches present and a new hole in the pipe about 16 inches away from the last patch closer to the street. I applied another patch and left it, I had too many other aspects of renovation to worry about at the time.

Then in June I noticed the same water gather on the lawn. I dug up the pipe again to find another hole about 12 inches out from the patch I installed.

After dealing with the power company for a few months and finally getting an engineer over to look at the ground on my water main, he did some diagnostics to determine that my house does use the water main as a ground a little more than other houses, but it isn't unsafe. He said the holes were not from electrolysis but most likely from old age (house built in 1954), a defective piece of pipe, or improper wall thickness pipe installed in the first place. He advised me to have a new water main installed and to put a 'bushing' on the main in order to isolate it from any stray current that may be present on the system from neighbors and such.

After a few hours of looking on the net, I've found no mention of any such bushing being used or what it's called. Any ideas?

It is a dielectric "device" but whether it has any benefit for ANYBODY, depends on whether there is actually a leak to ground and what kind of pipes you have. A galvanized pipe will develop holes after a few years, especially if it is "import" pipe which was common in the 50s.

I don't know how he came to that conclusion but many houses use the water main as a ground. What are you going to use to replace the main? If its plastic you will need to use a seperate grounding rod or plate but if its still copper it should be fine.

The current main with the holes in it is 3/4" copper.

New code states that I have to use 1" K copper. If I use plastic I have to have 10' of copper coming out of the house and 15' of copper from the curb. The two underground joints worry me so I'm going to go with copper.

He also gave me an extra ground rod to drive and hook up.

What should I call the device when I go to the plumbing supply house to pick up the copper tubing?

When I replaced my service pipe, the valve on the meter wouldn't budge. Rather than risk breaking it, I called the city and asked them to close the valve. When they saw the ditch, they dropped what looks like half of a dialectric union in the meter box. It was galvanized, so I went with a brass nipple and then copper.