Ben,
I really had mixed results with AlignMaster - even with Peters extended star list (the sterne.txt list) for the Southern Hemisphere I found that I could narrow down the missalignment fairly quickly (within a degree) but then I would have trouble with susequent iterations - some would get slightly closer (e.g. 15-20 mins) while others would get further apart (over a degree again !). I found that a lot of even the extended list would suggest stars that were way down in the sky behind houses or trees and there were some that I couldn't even find with Google
(the one with the really long Arabian sounding name
I spent one evening going backwards and forwards between Suhail and Acrux and each time it would struggle to get closer. Also - some pairings could be done only in one direction without adding again to the list.
I had better luck (or so I thought) with the 3.37 version of Synscan but that seemed to drift between subs from what I could make out.
I have some good ideas on what to try next though based on the information here though so thanks guys.