heater core bypass
 

Working on friends 84 N/A. Have the engine out doing clutch, bearings, seals, etc... This is going to be a track only car and possibly a spec racer at some point. I am thinking I should re-route the heater hoses to bypass the heater core. Any reason why this shouldn't be done?

personally, i would keep the heater core intact.
it doesn't affect anything else, it's not in the way of anything, it doesn't really weigh anything.

and worst case it works very well as a supplementary radiator if you start to run hot.

^ this

The Firehawk racers used to run the HVAC full hot to cool the engine. Must have sucked for the driver.

I don't know about the races that you intend to run in, but I presume that they would be run in the rain as well..if so, the you definitely want a demisting/defogging option. The hoses are cheap, and I would recommend changing them since they probably haven't been changed. You can get rid of a TON of weight by pulling out the sound deadening material out from under the dash, and footwells. You will need to do that anyway, to get to the heater hose clamps, since they are on the inside of the firewall.