Sandy Lirag is a Southern California resident who traces his enthusiasm for car audio to his dad's 1968 Mercedes Benz 280S sedan. It came equipped with a Becker AM/FM/Mono car stereo, but dad was not satisfied with that so he added an under-dash Pioneer 8-track unit with a pair of speakers in the rear deck. Sandy caught the bug and decided to work on mom's 1974 Toyota Corona, installing a a Sanyo AM/FM cassette player. He even tried a little custom installation in mom's car, putting in a pair of whizzer cone tweeters (which he snatched out of an old pair of Pioneer home speakers) in the front left and right air vents. His mission was to emulate stereo reproduction for the front passengers. Pretty unique, especially in 1974! As more and more innovative products started to surface from companies like Pioneer, Clarion, and Jensen, Lirag's interest in car audio grew. "Those early products provided more opportunities for me to explore car audio," recalls Lirag.
Lirag's career started in telecommunication sales for a construction company and car audio was in the background as a hobby. The wrath of car audio (the products, the technology and most of all the fun) was finally too much for Lirag to overlook so he got into the business in 1985 working for a retailer. Through the years, he worked in all different aspects of the business, from retailer, to sales rep, to manufacturers sales rep. He even involved himself with IASCA as a judge from 1990-1995 to further broaden his knowledge.
In June of 2000, Lirag purchased a brand new black Volkswagen Jetta. His plans for it were quite simple, to build a project vehicle. Some of the factors that contributed to him building this vehicle are his passion in building project vehicles; the fact that he works for Boston Acoustics; and lastly, since he is a sales manager that spends lots of time on the road, he wanted some tunes to help him pass the long miles.
Currently, Lirag shares driving duties with his sixteen-year-old son Jacques and, because of that, he listens to a wide variety of music. At home, he has a high-end home system so he loves to reference recordings in the vehicle. These two factors are reasons why Lirag set up the system for sound quality vehicle with a slightly weighted bass output for Jacques.
He considered doing the installation himself, but he knew that his installation skills aren't up to the standards of today's master installers. So instead, he left it to a professional, Steven Yiu, a freelance installer out of Arizona who is credited with producing some of the most fascinating installations on manufacturers demo vehicles. Another upside to Yiu is that he understood what Lirag wanted in his installation. "I am a bit [fastidious] when it comes to setting up systems. I am a perfectionist and Steven knows that. All I had to do was convey what I had in mind once, and Steven did his magic," states Lirag.
Sourced with Sony
The Jetta utilizes all Sony ES sources. A Sony CDX-M650ES CD receiver occupies the dash. The OEM location of the radio was positioned in a fashion where it is difficult to see, so Yiu completely modified and re-positioned the radio to enhance visibility and ease of use. The spare pocket was ditched and replaced with a more appealing fascia. To spice up the rather anemic looking dash, a hand polished aluminum trim ring (which matches the shifter housing), surrounds the radio and is flushed with the fascia.