Hi Scotty

I am a retired brit living in Thailand. I own 2 civics, a 1997 generation 6 and a 2002 gen 7.
On the 2002 Civic the steering was leaking and so about 2 years ago I swapped the complete steering with a secondhand one which they claimed was from Japan.
I also replaced the ball joints.
I did the job myself and worked as thoroughly as possible, checking everything I could read about, including the wheel alignment.
However, the steering is considerably heavier at the steering wheel than it should be.
Difficult to quantify, but lets say the steering is twice as heavy as it should be.
I don't know if there is any way to actually check the torque at the steering wheel.
Now 2 years later the steering is still heavy. 
Have you any idea what can be causing this?

Kind regards, Bernard Laverton