Had a go at Andy's suggestion to see if was useful,
turns out to be quite an improvement, more so than I thought.
New version 2.0.3.2 :
EDIT: made this the main version, no point in delaying for comparative testing.
All changes from previous version are as described below,
download link is in original post in this thread.
CHANGES :
Example with Elite M4 ship detail:
(a) initial view
(b) shift-clicked on round light on wing-tip (and mouse-wheel a bit):
(c) click-drag to rotate - it rotates around the clicked point:
(d) further mouse-wheel, get's it up close, which is the effect Andy was looking for I think:
(a)

(b)
(c)

(d)
When the viewer is in 'mouse control' mode (white mouse button in the toolbar) then :
1. you can now shift model(s) up/down/left/right/in/out in the screen axes (i.e. orthogonal to your viewing-plane)
2. you can now roll/yaw/pitch model(s) in their local axes (i.e. as in-game)

or
At any time (
& the most useful change) :
3. you can now 'Shift + Left-mousebutton-click' anywhere on a model & that 3D-point becomes the centre of 3D-rotation.
And:
4. The rotation given with left-button-down-mouse-movement (click-drag) is now more intuitive, it used to be
a bit confusing, now rotation 'follows' the mouse-cursor more closely which is hopefully clearer.
Other bits:
Pressing Ctrl key is now used for 'move/rotate all models together' (
was the right mouse button),
applies to all the above & to mouse rotations (ie left-mouse-button down & move mouse around)
While right-mouse-button is down, each view shows a marker indicating the centre of rotation for each model,
you can rotate models like this as well (i.e. don't need to press left-mouse-button at the same time).
The clock toolbar-button (Reset Animation) 'resets' all of the above transforms,
maybe it needs a separate button for each tranform set (?)
Relevant things that are still the same :
1. mouse-wheel still makes the camera to model view distance larger/smaller.
2. everything else...
I'll have to update the manual at some point if this beomes the new OP version.
Might need feedback about my choice of buttons though, not sure it's optimal,
or even available on all keyboards (?)