What would be causing a nasty smelling oily smoke too come from the vents inside my 2003 disagree Durango? How hard of a fix is it? An is it bad to be smelling and breathing what's coming out if have windows up and running heater?

 

you have a leaky heater core. Just went through that exact situation and the only fix is to remove the dash and replace the heater core. Very big job for the shade tree mechanic. It took me several days and a lot of whining. A shop will charge 1200.00 or more to do the job. If you do it, I highly recommend you replace the AC evaporator while you do this job. You will have to discharge the AC anyway. If you unhook the heater hoses and join them together as a bypass, you will stop the constant vapor fumes while you run the AC. Good luck!

 

Sounds like heater core. Took me a morning and afternoon to do mine earlier this summer. I'd also recommend replacing the a/c evaporator at the same time.

 

Not to sound repetitive, but I would also suggest doing the evaporator. And I’ll tell you why. I did my heater core at around 218,000 miles and didn’t have the spare cash to get an evaporator as well but it looked horrible. Put it all back together and since that day, over 4 years and 45,000 miles ago, it’s still in the back of my head and every day I think “today is gonna be the day that my evaporator goes out and I have to pull that dash again....� so it’s worth the peace of mind to spend the extra money and replace it while you’re in there.

 

I have this exact same issue in my 2000. I plan on bypassing till I have the time to put a new core and also evap in since I'll be in there.