diff --git a/poky/meta/classes-recipe/kernel.bbclass b/poky/meta/classes-recipe/kernel.bbclass
index 3834a42..bd3b647 100644
--- a/poky/meta/classes-recipe/kernel.bbclass
+++ b/poky/meta/classes-recipe/kernel.bbclass
@@ -367,6 +367,10 @@
 		export KBUILD_BUILD_TIMESTAMP="$ts"
 		export KCONFIG_NOTIMESTAMP=1
 		bbnote "KBUILD_BUILD_TIMESTAMP: $ts"
+	else
+		ts=`LC_ALL=C date`
+		export KBUILD_BUILD_TIMESTAMP="$ts"
+		bbnote "KBUILD_BUILD_TIMESTAMP: $ts"
 	fi
 	# The $use_alternate_initrd is only set from
 	# do_bundle_initramfs() This variable is specifically for the
@@ -412,6 +416,10 @@
 		export KBUILD_BUILD_TIMESTAMP="$ts"
 		export KCONFIG_NOTIMESTAMP=1
 		bbnote "KBUILD_BUILD_TIMESTAMP: $ts"
+	else
+		ts=`LC_ALL=C date`
+		export KBUILD_BUILD_TIMESTAMP="$ts"
+		bbnote "KBUILD_BUILD_TIMESTAMP: $ts"
 	fi
 	if (grep -q -i -e '^CONFIG_MODULES=y$' ${B}/.config); then
 		oe_runmake -C ${B} ${PARALLEL_MAKE} modules ${KERNEL_EXTRA_ARGS}
@@ -442,8 +450,8 @@
 		oe_runmake DEPMOD=echo MODLIB=${D}${nonarch_base_libdir}/modules/${KERNEL_VERSION} INSTALL_FW_PATH=${D}${nonarch_base_libdir}/firmware modules_install
 		rm "${D}${nonarch_base_libdir}/modules/${KERNEL_VERSION}/build"
 		rm "${D}${nonarch_base_libdir}/modules/${KERNEL_VERSION}/source"
-		# If the kernel/ directory is empty remove it to prevent QA issues
-		rmdir --ignore-fail-on-non-empty "${D}${nonarch_base_libdir}/modules/${KERNEL_VERSION}/kernel"
+		# Remove empty module directories to prevent QA issues
+		find "${D}${nonarch_base_libdir}/modules/${KERNEL_VERSION}/kernel" -type d -empty -delete
 	else
 		bbnote "no modules to install"
 	fi
@@ -697,7 +705,7 @@
 	fi
 }
 
-PACKAGESPLITFUNCS:prepend = "split_kernel_packages "
+PACKAGESPLITFUNCS =+ "split_kernel_packages"
 
 python split_kernel_packages () {
     do_split_packages(d, root='${nonarch_base_libdir}/firmware', file_regex=r'^(.*)\.(bin|fw|cis|csp|dsp)$', output_pattern='${KERNEL_PACKAGE_NAME}-firmware-%s', description='Firmware for %s', recursive=True, extra_depends='')