Ralph Gilles in the Motor Trend interview at the NY Auto Show, when asked about the Z/28, at about the 13:45 mark:
“Oh, man! You know what? It’s something. We did a concept ACR of the Challenger, and my owners, you know, the Moparians I call them, within seconds, emails, “Ralph, when are you going to do your version of that?” So, you know, we’re aware of that, and there’s people inside the company that think the same way. The Challenger is about to go under the knife. It’s actually under the knife as we speak. We’re doing to a lot to it, and, uh, we’re going to come with an answer for that and an answer for our friends at Ford. So, um, there’s a point where, we didn’t know what we were going to do with the Challenger. There’s talk about ‘Cuda, a lot of talk about ‘Cuda, and I’ll tell you guys out there, the ‘Cuda is not happening any time soon. Um, it’s a rumor that kind of went out of control. We looked at it, to be honest with you, we looked at the ‘Cuda. We said, if we did it, it wouldn’t be right to just do a re-bodied Challenger. It has to be something intrinsically new, so. The platform that that would come from is not ready yet. So it’s going to be sev-, a couple years out. In the meantime, we said let’s take that investment and re-invest in our baby, the Challenger. So we’re going to make what is a great car, an outstanding car. So stay tuned. This space, this time next year, you’ll see exactly what I’m talking about.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-ItYO0LoMU&feature=youtu.be
^Is this the source of the Barracuda rumors, or are they sourced from other statements by Mr. Gilles regarding this car?^
He said "'Cuda," not "Barracuda." Yes, he could just be using the nickname and might have meant "Barracuda."
He said "a couple years," and seemed to stumble over the words, as though he started to say "several," but then corrected himself (that's what it sounded like to me, anyway). Are we taking "couple" literally and interpreting it as "two"?
"...the 'Cuda is not happening any time soon."
2016 is three years from now, not two.
Isn't LA an architecture, like LC, and not a platform?