I have to agree that T-14 seems to do the job when it comes to swinging deep. The biggest stick I use is a fast 13'6' 7 wt. And the biggest head I use is 12' of T-14, but usually I throw longer, less massive tips (type 3 medium MOW). This is with a 525 or 550 skagit short.

I'm also perplexed by an intermediate Skagit. But new tools sometimes need an interested party to show their usefulness.

If I absolutely must scrape bottom, it's probably going to happen with a long leader and my patented "#4 sink tip" (a collection of #4 split shot). But at this point I am basically drift fishing with a fly rod, I'm OK with this...but perhaps it is not relevant to a chat about sink tips.