If you link a kernel with -m, does the link map look sane?

uh, i have no idea what this means.

   What about objdump output?

anything in particular?  i can output probably 1M of 'useful'
data with objdump and this file.  :-)
   
   If you build a miniroot kernel but dont stuffing a .fs into the
   miniroot space, and try and boot it, does that at least get loaded (up
   to trying to mount root)?

as i meantioned earlier, it is broken before mdsetimage runs.  the
exact same lossage happens either way.