Each 'tube' contains 10 rectangular pieces of clear acrylic plastic, with the numerals 0 thru 9 laser etched on each piece. The acrylic plastic used is chosen for it's ability to be 'edge lit'.
There are RGB leds mounted on the PCB, at the bottom of each 'tube', aligned in such a way that when activated the light enters the edge of each plastic piece ~ the light travels up through the plastic, and highlights the laser cut numerals.
To complete the 'illusion' they include some 'decorative' perforated stainless steel mesh over the sides of the piece, to give it that vacuum tube 'grid' look.
You'll get a better understanding by looking at this (because the images show different colours, not just orange) ->
In real life, they look nothing like 'nixie' tubes at all, but that's advertising for you ~ you can really only appreciate a nixie tube when you can look at it in 3D (and not the 2D plane of a photo)
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