For many years in the beginning of the propeller era the propeller shaft and its bearing was lubricated by seawater sealed only by a stuffing box in the engine room. As a result of this extreme wear both to the bearing and the shaft was a constant problem for the ship owners. In 1886 at Lindholmens Shipyard in Gothenburg one foreman, Frans Reinhold Cedervall was facing this problem in his daily work and got the idea of exchanging the water by oil as used in any other bearing i.e. in the engine. As a consequence to this he had to invent a seal retaining the oil in the stern tube. The result was a total success and in late 1886 he got a patent on his "Cedervall stern tube seal". In the beginning he only designed an aft seal and kept the inboard stuffing box. The first inboard Cedervall seal was developed in 1898. This first seal, called the "C" type was of a rather simple design but was later followed by more sophisticated seals like the aft split-type KR seal and the split-type forward MDX seal. The Cedervall Company was kept in the Cedervall family for two more generations. In 1974 the Lundgren family, who also is the present owner, bought up the company. The company has been located at five different places in Gothenburg and in 2005 moved in to the present plant in Arendal, Gothenburg. In 2001, by introducing the SeaQual seal, we took the step into a new era in stern-tube sealing technology.