95 Ford Contour 4cyl help please

ok here's what the problem is. One minute it will run fine and dandy next minute it will start to shut off and black smoke pours out the muffler and it acts like it's floodin out. the Check Engine Light is on but has always been on since the car was bought. Is their a way to read the CEL without taking it to a dealer? Someone said it was an O2 sensor but I dont really know. dont wanna spend anymore money on it than I have to. any help would be appreciated

yes, take it to autozone and theyll pull the code for free. If they cant tell you the meaning, tell me your code and ill tell you what it means.

I highly doubt its your 02 sensor if its running extremely rich. Your 02 sensor has no control over that.

See I live bout 75 miles from Autozone and I dont wanna attempt to drive it their b/c when it shuts off it dont wanna start back and ya can be goin down the road and it will just shut off. Any ideas on what it could be?

See I live bout 75 miles from Autozone and I dont wanna attempt to drive it their b/c when it shuts off it dont wanna start back and ya can be goin down the road and it will just shut off. Any ideas on what it could be?

im sure its a code saying that your rich.

any idea what would be causing it to run rich and shut off?

any idea what would be causing it to run rich and shut off?

could be numerous things. Your injector harness wiring could be cracked and your injectors could be arching causing them to run full duty. There was a recall on all the harnesses from 95-early 98, because the insullation on the wires cracked. Could just be a bad injector, but I highly doubt that. Could have something to do with your MAF. Get the codes pulled and that could give a good indication.

is their a way I can pull the codes myself?

go to walmart and get a OBD-I scanner

Actually, you don't need a scanner to read codes on the '95 Contour, which uses Ford's EEC-IV engine control system, sometimes referred to as OBD-I. Later ('96 and up) models use OBD-II, a far more complex interface standard, which requires a scanner.

Here's the best info I've found on this topic:

http://www.thorssell.net/hbook/index4.html

Note that the free pages are more than enough for what you need to get started.

Note that since the '95 Contour has a check engine light, you only really need a paper clip to dump the engine codes.