Mini GUSS vs Oscar
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 orchard/vineyard sprayer — GUSS Automation's smaller sibling to the base Orchard GUSS, built roughly 25% smaller to fit high-density orchard and vineyard rows. Same driverless GPS+LiDAR row navigation and laptop-based fleet supervision as the base machine (one operator can watch up to 8 units), on a 400-gallon tank with interchangeable vineyard and apple/high-density-orchard spray towers rather than the base machine's larger 600-gallon tank. Sold and serviced only through the John Deere/GUSS dealer network in the US and Australia; GUSS Automation is now a John Deere subsidiary following an acquisition confirmed on GUSS's own site.
Best for: Commercial vineyard, high-density-orchard and berry operations in the US or Australia that need a narrower, lower-profile autonomous sprayer than the base Orchard GUSS — its standard height (5 ft 4 in) and 400-gallon tank are sized for tighter row spacing rather than large tree-nut orchards.French autonomous field robot from Osiris Agriculture (Illies, Hauts-de-France; founded 2021) that self-navigates row crops via RTK-GNSS and delivers precision irrigation plus fertigation — nitrogen/potassium dosed into the water — through a foldable boom, generating its own electricity from the water flow as it runs (solar, diesel-generator or battery backup when off-water). Commercially sold since 2025 in northern France through distributor Verhaeghe Irrigation; Osiris itself lists crop-protection spraying as a future capability, not a current one.
Best for: Large-scale potato and vegetable growers in northern France (or similar row-crop regions) who already run hose-reel/boom irrigation and want to automate it while adding fertigation — the distributor cites roughly 25 ha as the economic break-even.| Mini GUSS Verified 2026-07-19 | Oscar Verified 2026-07-19 | |
|---|---|---|
| Overview | ||
| Task | Spraying | Spraying |
| Autonomy | Fully autonomous | Fully autonomous |
| Country of origin | United States | France |
| Availability | Available now | Available now |
| EU market | Pending | Pending |
| Lead time | Not disclosed | Not disclosed |
| Last verified | 2026-07-19 | 2026-07-19 |
| Specifications | ||
| Power source | Diesel — Cummins F3.8 173 hp Stage V engine; 77-gallon fuel cell gives roughly 12 hours of runtime (agtecher.com; not listed on gussag.com's own Mini GUSS page) | Electric — onboard water-turbine generator produces power from the irrigation flow itself; solar panels, a diesel generator, or batteries back it up when not connected to a water source |
| Required tractor power | Not applicable — self-propelled 4WD/4-wheel-steer platform, not a tractor implement | Not required for operation (self-propelled); road transport between fields via tractor tow, with regulatory approval for that still pending per one source |
| Dimensions | 19 ft long x 6 ft wide x 5 ft 4 in tall (standard/transport configuration); 9 ft 2 in tall with the Apple Tower fitted; 9 ft tall with the Vineyard Tower fitted (gussag.com) | 5.08 m long x 3.05 m wide x 3.43 m high; foldable boom extends to 40-44 m depending on configuration (sources vary between 24-40 m and up to 44 m) |
| Weight | Approx. 8,800-8,840 lb (3,990-4,010 kg) empty — two secondary listings give close but non-identical figures (agtecher.com: 8,840 lb / 4,010 kg; agricultural-robotics.com: 8,800 lb / 3,992 kg); not published on gussag.com itself | 12,000 kg |
| Min farm size | Not disclosed as a number; GUSS markets the Mini GUSS at commercial vineyard/orchard/berry scale, not hobby-farm scale | Roughly 25 ha (economic break-even point cited by French distributor Verhaeghe Irrigation) |
| Productivity | 77-gallon fuel cell gives approximately 12-hour runtime (agtecher.com); one operator can monitor/supervise up to 8 GUSS units at once from a laptop (GUSS fleet-supervision model, per agtecher.com and GUSS company materials) | Roughly 25-40 ha irrigated per week (sources vary), applying about 20-30 mm of water per week; water flow up to 60 m3/h |
| Max speed | Not disclosed | 100-250 m/h field travel speed |
| Sensors | GPS, LiDAR and onboard vehicle sensors for autonomous row navigation and obstacle avoidance (agtecher.com; consistent with the GUSS family's published navigation stack) | RTK-GNSS plus inertial measurement unit for centimetre-level autonomous navigation; onboard cameras for plant growth and soil-moisture monitoring |
| Price & model | ||
| Price (EUR) | ≈€261,000 (converted from the agtecher.com USD listing; not independently confirmed by the manufacturer) | €250,000 |
| Native price | $283,660 USD (agtecher.com equipment-marketplace listing — GUSS Automation does not publish Mini GUSS pricing on its own site, same as the sibling base GUSS profile in this catalog; a separate secondary listing (agricultural-robotics.com) gives a bundled $300K-400K range across the whole GUSS/Mini GUSS/Herbicide GUSS family, not Mini-GUSS-specific, which is a loose but not contradictory cross-check) | €250,000 |
| Business model | Buy, sold and serviced through the John Deere/GUSS Automation dealer network in the US and Australia (gussag.com dealer locator); no Mini-GUSS-specific lease or pay-for-service option was found (contrast Herbicide GUSS, which GUSS does offer as a service option per the sibling base-GUSS profile). | Direct purchase; base price ~€250,000 HT (excl. tax), indicative €200,000- 300,000 range reported depending on configuration (wheel count, boom width, hose length, tyres, guidance system) — versus roughly €100,000 HT for a traditional hose-reel-with-boom irrigator. Sold in northern France through distributor Verhaeghe Irrigation (Montdidier, Somme); Osiris Agriculture also sells and demonstrates directly. |
| Ongoing cost | Diesel fuel, tires and spray consumables (nozzles, pump wear parts); no published service-cost figures were found. GUSS's own Mini GUSS page notes eligibility for California's CARB FARMER equipment-replacement incentive funding, a US-specific program, not a running cost. | Not disclosed — no published subscription, per-hectare service fee, or consumables schedule found beyond the buyer-configured hardware options at purchase. |
| Key outcome | ||
| Best verified result | Chemical and water use with the Smart Apply option up to 50% chemical and water savings on average (vendor figure) · vendor | Water use vs. conventional hose-reel/cannon irrigation ~-30% (vendor commitment) · vendor |
| EU context | ||
| CE marking | Not disclosed — no CE-marking evidence found on gussag.com; the manufacturer's own dealer locator lists only US and Australia coverage | Not confirmed — no explicit CE-marking statement found on the manufacturer site or in trade press. Osiris is reported to be developing separate "autonomy certification" to run the robot without an on-site supervisor, implying current commercial operation is supervised. |
| Machinery Regulation | Not applicable — no evidence Mini GUSS has been placed on the EU market | Placed on the French/EU market commercially since 2025; would fall under the autonomous-machine provisions of Regulation (EU) 2023/1230, but no explicit compliance statement was found in the sources checked. |
| CAP subsidy | Not applicable — no EU/CAP-linked deployment found; in the US, GUSS's own Mini GUSS page notes eligibility for California's CARB FARMER equipment-replacement incentive program, which is unrelated to EU CAP | Precision water and fertiliser dosing could support CAP eco-scheme water-efficiency measures; no direct CAP linkage has been published by Osiris. |
"—" 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.