New car? nothing. forget about it. they all have 12 tons of extra gizmos built in. Maybe your basic commercial panel van wouldn't have all that stuff built in.

New car? nothing. forget about it. they all have 12 tons of extra gizmos built in. Maybe your basic commercial panel van wouldn't have all that stuff built in. You could drive a white panel van. Start a catering business. Go back about 12 years and prior and you still have an ECU, but it doesn't have a bunch of information logging stuff built in, yet you have the benefits of a modern computer controlled ECU to control fuel injection and ignition timing. It's going to control those things based on some pre-defined maps and the input of several sensors. One to sense airflow at the intake, a sensor for throttle position, a sensor for cam or crank position, and an O2 sensor in the exhaust to tell the computer how complete the combustion is, and to adjust the mix accordingly. Closed loop system. There is probably also a knock sensor in there. maybe a few other failsafes to turn on an idiot light on the dashboard. coolant temperature, oil pressure, fan control, Maybe also a basic anti-lock brake system. Most basic cars don't have any fancy traction control stuff at that point. After that? They get more complex ever year. steering angle sensors, yaw sensors, traction control, selective braking drive-by-wire throttle instead of a cable connected between your foot and the throttle plate, electric power steering, sensors that apply the brakes so you don't rear-end the guy in front of you, backup cameras, parking assist systems, more stuff offloaded to more powerful car control systems.