Before the wire gets potentially hot enough to start a fire, wouldn't the car notice a voltage drop and automatically lower the amps? I have to think Tesla thought of this and if not, there would be a lot of fires.
I agree 100% with following the code and being safe and I would never trust voltage drop sensing vs. proper wiring, but I'm curious if anyone here knows whether the car does this or not.
Keep in mind that we are mixing "code" and "safe." Code covers many scenarios (wire in a well insulated wall, house in a very hot climate, etc.) There is margin built in for safety. A 60 amp draw on a 6 gauge romex is 9% over its rating. This means ~19% more heat in the wire. Is this to code? No. Is this safe? That's a different debate. Since the vast majority of the members here aren't qualified to judge electrical safety, I think it's best to keep to code.
As far as the car preventing a fire by noting the voltage drop, that is not something I'd rely on. It will happily charge at 48 amps with a 5 volt drop. That's 240 watts being dissipated in the system. If that heat is spread out across a long wire, no big deal. If that heat is in a small area, it is more than enough to light a fire. A 30 watt soldering iron can easily start a fire.
Edit: I just noticed that Johnny Vector covered some of this while I was typing my reply.
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