I never had an Autopilot but I did have a Hydrovane wind steering gear on both my Ocean going boats. Both wind vanes, bright red in colour were named Eric in honour of the Viking voyager, Eric the Red.
It amuses me now to think that long after I've snuffed it, anyone reading one of my old logs books and knowing that I was always singlehanded, will wonder, at least for a time ,who the heck was Eric...
My wife's uncle was a dedicated radio operator. He was able to read 2 morse signals at the same time when he worked at Bletchley in WW2. He had contacts all over the world. His garden was full of aerials & one room of his house was stuffed with gear
His call sign was- George,2 Dog, Peter, Queen
So when I installed my Aries, to supplement my first electric autopilot, called George (Many autopilots were called George in the war I believe) We decided not to call it George 2, but "Uncle Claude" after his call sign. Uncle Claude has looked after me on many occasions when the Raymarine George has failed miserably.
We met some people in the Cape Verdes with a hydrovane like ours. We chatted. Ours was a bit boring Robbie the rudder. There's was Carly, as in Simon, you're so vain.
Out autopilots were all called Arthur, named for an early sailing instructor who taught us the advantages of sailing in a relaxed/low effort manner: "Nothing to be gained in arriving a half hour earlier if it leaves you so tired you need two hour's sleep to recover on arrival."
Our wind vane was named 'The Lizard' because it was a Monitor.
Previous boat was ‘Otto’, the current boat (hydraulic ram) is ‘Moaning Myrtle’.
Wind vanes we’ve had ‘Maggie’ (‘cos the lady was not for turning), ‘’Pubes’ (was an Aries - I’ll leave the rest to you…) and Scarlett (as in ‘Gone with the wind’ a red Hydrovane).
On my previous boat it was Keira. After Keira Knightley who proved in Pirates of the Caribbean what a desirable crew member she could be.
On my new boat it hasn't got a name yet. Like the upper classes, I think it's important to get to know a baby before giving it a name based on its character.