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Replaced the steering oil with Ford 600, turned the box screw just a little, and steering is responsive and sharp now. I bled the brakes again, tightened the adjusting rod, and the pedal is nice and stiff. But now, especially when I hit the brakes hard, the vehicle pulls to the right. I know this is a wheel issue. The tire spins freely on a lift, so nothing is binding. Maybe the pad to drum distance need to be adjusted?

In your other post you were discussing adjusting the brake pedal free play and the shoe to drum clearance. We came away from that discussion with firm advice to adjust per the manual and you would have to use the early IH Scout book for the shoe to drum adjustment.

You never mentioned a pull to one side in any of the other posts you started this week.

Now you say you have adjusted pedal free play and bled the brakes and now have a pull to right side when applying the brakes. It stands to reason now that your bleeding left some air in one of the left wheel cylinders. Unless you actually had the pull to right issue all along and failed to mention it in your posts.

It was there, both me and my mechanic friend Chris noticed it. It had popped up at random while the jeep was sitting for months waiting for the engine to be rebuilt. We thought, with some driving, it might disappear. I thought it mostly did, and it seamed with the loose steering wheel play that it could be neither, or coming randomly from either side. Now that I have tightened up the brakes and steering wheel, I'm noticing it once again. Not as strong as before, but definitely a pull from the right side, especially when breaking from higher speeds.
And by the way, I flushed the brakes and adjusted the tightening screw, I didn't pop open the drums.

So some suggestions on where to look starting with the easy and cheap item's and working our way up:
(Some of these may sound dumb but dumb is not seeing the forest because of the trees!!!

1- Are tire pressures equal?

2-Are treads the same design and condition?

3-Is wheel bearing play the same on both sides front and then again on both sides rear?

4-Is the brake shoe contact area with the drum equal on the two fronts?

5-Is the brake shoe contact area with the drum equal on the two rears?

6-Are all brake shoes same thickness and same composition?

7-Are any of the shoe or drum surfaces contaminated with anything?

8-Is steering pivot slop the same on both sides?

9-Is tie rod slop the same on both sides?

10-Are the spring rates and height the same side to side?

11-Have you had a front end shop check the caster, camber and toe on all 4 wheels?

That should keep you pretty busy and we shouldn't hear from you until you can print all 11 of your answers unless you have a question about an individual item.

Lets try to keep this in this same post all the way to a final resolution!

You need to do the pad to Drum adjustment... one side is too loose or the other side is too tight...

M-38 Specs are 0.005 at the bottom of the pad and 0.008 at the top of the pad... I just did mine and all is well... Finally

I know you have an M-38A1 but there is a similar adjustment in the TM for yur jeep... you need to do as Wes says and READ THE BOOK...

He has IH Scout 11" brakes which he adjusted shoe to drum clearance on yesterday. They are quite different. Let's not shotgun troubleshoot this one. Let's let Dan run the checklist I gave him in the given order and get back to us.

So, turned out to be easier than I thought. I checked tire pressure and steering linkage, sprayed down the brakes with brake cleaner. The steering I had adjusted a little too stiff, and I loosened that up slightly. I was about to pull the wheels and check the pads, when the guy who sold me the brakes got back to me and said they were self adjusting. Then I read that the way the brakes self adjust is you back up and brake hard. I did that a few times, and no more pulling problems.

That's great! In glad to see that you found a solution.