Can you touch the tubes?

Wash your hands 1st will minimize oil and give you a better grip. If you can, avoid touching the identifying markings on the glass. If you do, lack of oil will be beneficial.

Whether base or not, use the lower hand for the lifting force, and the other hand on the top, applying any needed minimal movement to help the pins slide up.

The bases are glued on, to give you something to grab/lift. they are no part of the vacuum seal of the glass. The glass may also be broken, a separate issue. If a base becomes loose or partially loose, the tube may be fine. IOW, you still have a working unit. Then you are faced with the decision: buy a pair or quad pair of matched tubes, and keep the loose base as a spare if needed, so you are not without music.

btw, tube testers usually have a few size tube pin straighteners.

Since Halogen was brought up, I’ll tell you my experience with 400 watt Metal Halide for Office Lighting.

I designed Corporate Office Space for a living. I was an early adopter and specifier of Furniture Mounted Indirect Lighting for Office Cubies. Very efficient, no reflections of ceiling light fixtures in computer screens, indirect light (bounced off ceilings) light from several directions minimized shadows. Total watts needed for large space far lower than using ceiling fluorescent. Important because many buildings AC systems were already overloaded by then new computers everywhere! Reduce that Lighting Load!

Used them for many clients, including IBM, JP Stevens, CBS several subsidiaries, Time Life, Fortune Magazine, Many Insurance Companies, Lawyers ...

The fixtures had tempered glass covers, lamps had to be replaced, I found out several clients either left the glass covers off, or replaced them with non-tempered glass.

GE issued a bulletin years after they promoted these for office use: these lamps may experience ’non-passive’ end of life (another member mentioned ’non-passive above). I called GE, what the hell does non-passive mean?

Oh, well, the lamp can explode, blasting broken glass up to 2,700 degrees in all directions. Any other questions?

And yes Dorothy, if you got/left any finger oil on them, they could/would explode.

Holy Crap: these fixtures were typically located at the intersection of 4 cubies.

I issued my own bulletin to all clients: explained the ’non-passive’ to clients, scared them as best I could, and made it perfectly clear that ALL of these fixtures MUST have their Tempered Glass Covers properly installed and secure.

The outer glass may be ONLY 800F degrees, the inner glass typically 2,000F, a failure, up to 2,700F

I never specified them again.