My heater core went about a week ago and I tried to get by with just keeping my vents closed and windows opened and refilling the coolant every now and then, but the smell is overwhelming. I know it is not thing to replace the heater core, but I have very limited time. So, I just clamped the inlet and outlet hoses to the core near the firewall and that solved the problem for now; no fluid is getting to the core so I no longer have a leak.

Other than losing the option to heat the car (no problem since I live in Florida), can this solution cause me any problems? In other words, will the coolant still circulate freely through the rest of the engine now that i have bypassed the heater core? I have been running it like this for a week (no more than 50miles at a time) and so far have had no troubles with high temps or overheating.

Thanks for you input.

I cant tell you for sure if it will be bad or not. I can suggest 2 things: Instead of clamping the hoses off just remove them from the inlet/outlet and join them together with a straight or 90 degree connection or look for a product called Bars Leaks specifically the one for heater core leaks. I have used it on some other cars and it seems to do okay.

im not sure either, but agree with brian1, by clamping both off, you arent allowing the to circulate water.... you need this circulatin, when the core in our aerostar went bad, we got some smaller coper pipe and some garden hose and made a bypass for the valve, still allowing the coolant to circulate