What version of PHD is it? The are some differences in behaviour between versions.
Check the brain settings.
You don't have "Disable guide output" ticked?
You don't have "Dec guide mode" set to "Off"?
How many steps does it take to do the calibration? You want it to take something around 15 in each direction. If it is less, reduce the calibration step size. If more increase it. For a scope like your Vixen (1050mm f/11) it should be something in the 750-1000 range.
What are the max duration settings? If they are too small PHD may not be able to keep up with drift from poor polar alignment. There is no real issues with making it too big as PHD will only request the step it thinks it needs. 2000 is probably overkill, but you never know.
There were posts about using PHD to do drift alignment recently.
This one and
this one in particular. If you can make sense of them you may not need Alignmaster.
Andrew