If my heater core is dying how do I know?

Question

87 ford ranger. Occasional smell of antifreeze mostly inside truck. No visible leaks or collant loss. All hoses new.

Answer 1

The antifreeze is from the heater core. The heater core looks like a mini radiator and sits inside a housing with the blower fan, it takes air and blows it across the fins of the heater core and the heated air warms the car or windshield. If the heater core is leaking you might see a small leak on the floorboar inside, you may see a film or vapor on the windshield when you trun on the defroster, all the defroster does is redirect the air from the floor and dashvents to the windshield vents.
Heater cores are a real pain, some radiator repair shops will do them, as will car dealers, the problem is that they are located in a housing buried in the dash and require a lot of disassembly to get to.
Once the core starts leaking it won't stop. So you can fix it, live with the leak which can eventually cause the engine to overheat if the leak gets too big or you can reroute the hoses that go into the heater core and bypass it. If you do that, you will not have any hot air to defrost the windshield or permit hot air into the truck as the blower will move only the colder air. To bypass it, you simply remove the two hoses going thru the firewall usually on the passenger side and using a 1/2' or 3/4" piece of pipe, connect them together, it'll solve the problem but you lose your heating capability.
My suggestion, shop around and find a shop that can fix it so you have the heat and don't hram the engine later.

Answer 2

could be the heater core but most times ull get a film on ur inside glass or ur windows will just fog up 4 no reson thats heatercore problems also ull feel the carpet and it feel wet and sticky if its leaking on the inside check around the engine compartment it may be sepage from a loose hose clamp or a bad hose if ur loosing coolent have it presure tested good luck

Answer 3

If the heater core is failing you will notice either a puddle of coolant on the floor on the passenger side of the truck, or white steamlike substance on the windshield when in defrost mode.

Answer 4

Sure sounds like a bad heater core.

PS eventually you'll notice an oily film on the inside of the windshield. Forget about any kind of remedies except replacing it unless you end up selling it.