Just thought you'd find this interesting. I also have an 89 RS and when my heater core went south, I was going to bypass the core like you did. As it turned out, I didn't have to. All I did was move the temp lever on the heater controls all the way over to cold and it bypassed it anyways! If you have an A/C car, the heater bypass valve automatically cuts off coolant flow to the core when you move the lever to cold. If you have a faulty bypass valve, or your car is non-A/C, then disregard this.

BTW, I only did that for the summer. Once it got towards the fall, I took the plunge and replaced the leaky core.