Hi,
I don't know what are the differences between your sof file and the one from the project but there has to be a difference. As I wrote before it would be very helpful if you post the failure message. Nobody but you can see the message. So helping you is not possible.
Of course you can't use the ptf file from the example project and your own sof file. The two files must match. So either use ptf and sof from example or both from your own generated. When you use your own files you have to default the kernel settings in 'make menuconfig'
Urmel