Look closely at the screen grab below, taken from the first-season episode "The Hungry Sea."

Excluding the neon loops at the top of the neon array, and counting down from the middle, there are sixteen rows of neon tubes. Craig Reinbrecht, with his meticulous eye for detail, was the first robot builder to bring this interesting fact to my attention.

Now, look at the following screen grab from the second season episode "Wreck of the Robot."

It is easier to count the number of rows in this enlargement made from the same screen grab:

I count twelve rows of neon tubes.

Here is another view of the neon tubes from the first episode of the second season, "Blast Off Into Space."

Being careful to exclude the two tubes that form the loop at the top, one again counts only 12 tubes.

Why were the number of neon tubes changed? Who decided that twelve tubes were better than sixteen? We may never have the answers to these questions. Robot builders, however, now have another point of accuracy upon which to reflect.

Regardless of the reasons for the change in neon design, the neon tubes frequently broke and were hastily repaired. In the first-season episode "War of the Robots," the robot has the regular sixteen neon tubes in some scenes. In other scenes, not only are there only ten tubes, but the lower register of tubes is crooked. This suggests that an accident, followed by a hasty repair, occurred during the filming of the episode. By the end of the episode, however, the regular sixteen-rowed neon array is back.
 
 

In this shot, the standard sixteen rows of neon tubes are present.	In this scene, not only are there fewer rows, but the neon tubes are crooked. The tubes also appear to be of a larger diameter.
In this scene, I count only ten rows of neon tubes. Can this be correct?	When illuminated and enlarged, it is easier to verify that there are indeed only ten rows of large-diameter tubes in this shot.