GUSS vs YV01 autonomous vineyard sprayer
Two spraying machines, one verified table. Every figure below is sourced and dated; vendor claims are labelled and kept apart from independent results.
California-built (Kingsburg) autonomous sprayer for orchards and vineyards, now a wholly owned John Deere subsidiary after an August 2025 acquisition that followed a three-year joint venture. GUSS navigates rows itself on GPS + LiDAR with no driver on board, but GUSS/Deere describe this as "supervised" autonomy — one operator monitors and can remotely intervene on up to 8 machines at once from a laptop. The line spans base GUSS (600-gal tank, diesel), Mini GUSS (smaller footprint for vineyards/high-density orchards/berries), Herbicide GUSS (sensor-triggered spot-spray weed control) and a 2024 fully electric option; sold and serviced only through John Deere dealers in the US and Australia, with 250+ units deployed globally as of the 2025 acquisition.
Best for: Large commercial orchard, vineyard and berry operations in the US or Australia (almonds, walnuts, pistachios, citrus, stone fruit, wine grapes) wanting to shrink a multi-tractor spray crew — GUSS's own case study shows a conventional 8-worker, 6-tractor medium-scale crew dropping to 2 workers and 4 GUSS units.Crawler-tracked autonomous spraying robot for steep, narrow vineyards — inverted-U frame straddles vines up to 1.4 m, 200 L electrostatic spray tank, 45% slope capability. Developed by Yanmar, on sale in France since 2023 through dedicated subsidiary Yanmar Vineyard Solutions (Champagne region focus, Moët & Chandon partnership); a weeder attachment was added in 2024.
Best for: Steep Champagne-style narrow vineyards that want to take the operator out of plant-protection spraying — no driver exposure to chemicals, slopes to 45%.| GUSS Verified 2026-07-18 | YV01 autonomous vineyard sprayer Verified 2026-07-16 | |
|---|---|---|
| Overview | ||
| Task | Spraying | Spraying |
| Autonomy | Fully autonomous | Fully autonomous |
| Country of origin | United States | Japan |
| Availability | Available now | Available now |
| EU market | Pending | CE-marked |
| Lead time | Not disclosed | Not disclosed |
| Last verified | 2026-07-18 | 2026-07-16 |
| Specifications | ||
| Power source | Diesel — John Deere 4.5L 173 hp Stage V engine (Tier 3 available for export); Herbicide GUSS uses a 4.5L 74 hp Stage V engine (no DEF); a fully electric variant (Electric GUSS, John Deere KREISEL batteries) launched 2024 | Petrol — Honda iGX800 2-cyl air-cooled engine (~25–27 hp), 19 L tank |
| Required tractor power | Not applicable — self-propelled 4WD/4-wheel-steer platform, not a tractor implement | Is the vehicle (twin-crawler autonomous chassis) |
| Dimensions | GUSS: 24 ft long x 6 ft 4 in tall x 8 ft 3 in wide (standard tires; 7 ft 6 in narrow / 8 ft 4 in low-impact options). Herbicide GUSS: 23 ft 6 in long x 6 ft 4 in tall x 8 ft 4 in transport width, 15-19 ft adjustable spray width | Inverted-U straddle frame for vines up to 1.4 m height |
| Weight | GUSS: 11,660 lb empty. Herbicide GUSS: 12,460 lb empty (manufacturer brochure) | ~1 t |
| Min farm size | Not disclosed as a number; manufacturer brochure markets GUSS at small, medium and large operation scales (its own "small scale" case study is still a professional commercial grower, not a hobby farm) | Not disclosed |
| Productivity | 90-gallon fuel cell gives approximately 13-14 hour run time; one operator can monitor/supervise up to 8 GUSS machines at once; manufacturer case study cites refill downtime cut from a typical 45 minutes to about 3 minutes | Autonomous spraying along pre-mapped vineyard paths; 200 L spray tank |
| Max speed | Not disclosed | 4 km/h |
| Sensors | GPS + LiDAR for autonomous row navigation; user interface flags position/spray-rate/mobility faults with automatic visual and audible alerts; Herbicide GUSS adds multiple onboard weed-detection sensors for spot-spraying | GNSS RTK positioning with Ntrip correction · pre-mapped field and path definition via web system · counter-rotating crawlers for tight headland turns |
| Price & model | ||
| Price (EUR) | Not disclosed | Not disclosed |
| Native price | Not disclosed | Not disclosed |
| Business model | Buy, sold and serviced exclusively through John Deere dealers in the US and Australia; Herbicide GUSS is also offered as a pay-for-service option alongside outright purchase. No unit price published. | Sold and serviced by Yanmar Vineyard Solutions SAS, a dedicated Yanmar Group company in France |
| Ongoing cost | Diesel fuel, tires, spray consumables (nozzles, pump wear parts) and scheduled maintenance through the John Deere dealer network; costs not published | Petrol; spray consumables; service via Yanmar Vineyard Solutions |
| Key outcome | ||
| Best verified result | Spray-crew labour and equipment at medium scale 8 workers to 2 workers (75% fewer); 12 pieces of towed/tractor equipment to 4 GUSS units · vendor | Operator exposure during spraying Driverless spraying — worker removed from dangerous field work · vendor |
| EU context | ||
| CE marking | Not disclosed — no CE-marking evidence found; confirmed commercial deployment is US and Australia only | Sold as a series product in France — CE conformity expected; not independently verified |
| Machinery Regulation | Not applicable — no evidence GUSS has been placed on the EU market | Marketed in the EU via Yanmar Vineyard Solutions SAS (France); conformity documentation not published |
| CAP subsidy | Not applicable — no EU/CAP-linked deployment found; case-study savings above relate to US/Australia operations | Electrostatic targeted spraying supports pesticide-efficiency goals; petrol drive offers no emissions benefit |
"—" means the manufacturer has not disclosed the figure; we never estimate silently. Model either machine's payback with your own numbers on its ROI calculator page.