So have individual circuits for each room in the house so each room has its own breaker as well. My main objective is to be able to use the TP-Link AV1200 powerline internet extender from the basement to the 2nd floor. Most of the breakers are 10A. I wanted to combine 2 light load circuits (Basement wall outlet which is never used and guest room wall outlets) into one circuit so they have the same powerline. Can this be done? since these circuits are basically never used, i figured combining them wouldn't do much in terms of total load.

Please advise.

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    Does it not work now? How many phases of power do you have coming into your house? (North American folks you always get 2 poles, I'm asking about phases as occur in the rest of the world.) – Harper Apr 10 '18 at 17:41

The only situation I can think of where this might be an issue is if either or both of these circuits you want to combine is/are part of other multiwire branch circuits, meaning their neutral is shared with another circuit's neutral. If they both have their own exclusive neutrals or are already sharing a neutral in a mutual multiwire branch circuit it shouldn't be an issue.

Oh, one other thing just occurred to me. You mentioned a basement wall outlet, but didn't mention whether the guest rooms are also in the basement. In any case, if the basement circuit happens to be protected with a GFCI breaker, and/or the guest rooms are protected with an arc-fault breaker you could have issues. Current NEC codes require arc-fault protection in bedrooms (as well as many other living spaces) and gfci protection for outlets in unfinished basement spaces. You might have an issue there. If only one of those I've mentioned is the case, be sure to combine the neutrals as well by pigtailing them together into the return lug on the breaker. And be sure not to circumvent the NEC's safety rules for either type of location. There is a dual-purpose AFCI-GFCI type of breaker manufactured to take care of both at once, but they are around $200 where I live.


From a safety point of view it's not going to cause a problem.

Whether it causes a compliance problem depends on the regulations where you live, since you don't say where you live (from your mention of 10A breakers for the sockets I would guess you do not live in the US or UK) we can't give a definitive answer on that. I belive that some European countries restrict the number of sockets on each breaker.

  • Sorry for not clarifying! I live in Canada. So you're saying it would be ok to connect the two power wires to one breaker? and this would in a sense create a series circuit for the 2 rooms? – Trik Apr 20 '18 at 2:37

I have used similar powerline internet (technically "network", though for almost anyone that is for purposes of a network connected to the internet) extenders several times. I have never seen a requirement that the circuits involved all be on the same breaker, and I have never bothered to check for that and never had a problem with that issue. There really should not be a need for the circuits to share a breaker as the breaker is only there to handle faults (and interrupt the circuit when there is a fault) - overcurrent and possibly ground fault or arc fault.

However, depending on how these devices work, there MAY be an issue with phases - i.e., it may be that if all circuits (no matter how many breakers) are on the same phase that they will work OK but that if they are on different phases then they might not.

My suggestion is to try the powerline extenders on different circuits and see what works and what (if anything) doesn't.

  • The adapters state they have to be on the same circuit in the house. We paired them on the same circuit (Same room) but when we took the extender upstairs, it showed poor signal. So im thinking its because they have to be on the same electrical circuit – Trik Apr 20 '18 at 2:39
  • @Trik I downloaded the AV1200 manual. It does say the devices all need to be on the same circuit. That is a HUGE limitation. Most newer houses have a lot of different circuits in order to meet newer code requirements. However, a pair of circuit breakers shouldn't have any effect on data transmission, so my hunch is that the real issue is indeed phases - if you happen to pick 2 circuits that are on different phases then only neutral will be in common and things won't work so well. If they are on the same phase then logically there should be no problem at all. – manassehkatz Apr 20 '18 at 3:01
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    Hey! So for some odd reason late last night, i decided to give the extenders another try. And for god knows what reason, it worked this time! i will still run some range tests and try different outlets in different rooms but for now.. it works! im confused because i did the exact same thing the first time but the signal did not stabilize or was very poor but it seems to be fine now. – Trik Apr 20 '18 at 13:52

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