that what I see and experience, both myself and from other cruisers, including MANY who have gone around the world at least once, you are completely and totally wrong.

I have both, an autopilot and a Monitor wind vane. Without a doubt, the wind vane is far and away better than the autopilot. As a matter of fact, about the only time I use the autopilot is during the day when in traffic area and not much at that.

As to your statement, "windvanes are complicated devices with dissimilar metal parts, fragile pins, joints and couplings, underwater stainless welds, etc"
WRONG WRONG WRONG. It's only complicated if you are not willing to just look at it or learn to use it. Yes, it's more than "one button on and off", but way less complicated than doing a compass swing and the setup autopilots require when installed and updated every so often. So, that also negates your statement, ".. that require maintenance and do break at times."

I have had three problems/breakdowns with my autopilots (one was very old) and 0, zip, nada problems with my Monitor!!

Greg