Just to sort out any misunderstandings: The only true single coils in BL's range are the current Keystones and Micro Coils.
All models in the 200, 202, 280, 290 and 298 series are single coil sized, twin coil, noise cancelling pickups. The L-48 is twin coil, too, designed to deliver pure tele tones.
The only thing SD's Hot Rail has in common with BL's are magnets and coil wire. Regarding tone, they're worlds apart. BL's are way cleaner, with no hint of over-wind muddiness. Hot Rails are designed to mimic large humbuckers with heavy distortion.
Bill on the other hand, designs his twin coil pickups for the sweetest and cleanest possible sounds, high output and no hum. The added bonus is that in the hands of a capable guitarist, they're brilliant for distorted sounds, too.
Of the current BL's, the TLE is the pickup which best fits your needs. Handling heavy distortion is no problem at all with the TLE, and the clean sounds are really good, too.
That said, you can use any pickup you like with heavy distortion. At stage volume - which is the setting where BL's really shines by the way- humbuckers and single coils will be equally well fitted for heavy distortion. It's all a matter of personal taste and which sound you're looking for. I suspect however that you're looking for a pickup which will help overdrive (the preamp) at lower volumes, and in that case a humbucker with a higher output (300-450 mV compared to a strat pickup's 80-150 mV) will come in handy.
The output of the TLE is somewhere between those. IMHO a brilliant heavy rock pickup in every thinkable way.