I had a Contour like that... was a 95 purple contour GL too. Basically the running hot part, is just the sending unit, check engine might be EGR related, all I can think of...

Former owner of a 1995 Ford Contour GL w/ 2.0L ATX Proud owner of a 2005 Ford Taurus SE 3.0L V6 Vulcan --Looking for Commodore stuff (Drives, Units, Amiga, games, etc)If anyone has any of this laying around and wants it gone, lemme know --