I keep reading that, yet it's all hearsay. I do know two things:
1) Schuko is officially rated for 16 A AC or 10 A DC, which can be written as either 10-/16~ or just 10/16
2) Some very old Schuko sockets are only marked 10 A/250 V.
I wouldn't exclude the possibility that the alleged 10 A continuous/16 A short-term rating is a simple misunderstanding of the abbreviated DC/AC rating.
A 10A socket will often survive 16A for a short time (not-uncommonly an hour or two, at least for a one-off test), provided there are no other points of elevated resistance (poor terminations, corrosion etc.); although by the same logic, a 16A socket should briefly survive around 25A. I've tested rewireable Australian plugs and sockets (normally rated at 10A, but the only difference from the 15A version is earth pin width) up to 24A (with 1.5mm^2 flex as standard for 15A) without melting down.
I recently saw one YouTube comment referring to people as "idiots" for running 3kW heaters through BS 1363 sockets; harsh much?
Not only does that diminish the very meaning of the word "idiot", but then why are 3kW workshop heaters still readily available with a 13A plug? (It was claimed that the sockets are no longer built for sustained full load, since 3kW heaters became uncommon in the household.) Some vendors do recommend hard-wiring via a 20A fused spur for "long term" use, but I gather that the fuse may be more to blame than the plug itself. (I saw one claim of BS 1362 fuses only being rated for 1,000 hours at full load, which to me seems pitiful... And under moderate overloads, say 20A, the fuse can get hot enough to melt thermoplastic plugs.)
As you may gather, I have a significant aversion to "cop-outs" around the extent of usage; observing their semi-regular delivery after-the-fact in attempts to downplay product defects, I only accept differentiation between better and worse "grades" of product where the usage difference (and the difference in manufacturing cost!) is substantive enough to justify it.
Anyhow, in my experience competently-wired Australian plugs will normally remain cool to the touch while passing 10A (as can be expected from an essentially 15A design). Molded plugs are as iffy as they are everywhere else (frameless NEMA types notwithstanding).
