Washington - Astronauts aboard the International Space Station are hoping for a little more elbow room, and the crew of the space shuttle Endeavour intends to help.

The shuttle is set to blast off at 2355 GMT Friday for a 15-day flight. The US reentry vehicle is headed to the orbiting ISS, which will mark its 10th anniversary during the mission.

The Endeavour will deliver 6,538 kilograms of supplies and equipment to upgrade the space station's living space and prepare it for more residents on longer-term assignments after the retirement in 2010 of the US fleet of aging reusable orbiters.

The payload will be delivered in the reusable, Italian-built Leonardo module that will be transferred to the ISS using the shuttle's robotic arm. Astronauts will later fill it with old equipment and scientific samples and bring it back to Earth aboard Endeavour.

The delivery includes an exercise machine, a second toilet, two sleep stations and a water recycling pump to turn urine into drinking water. New kitchen equipment will also be part of the delivery with the addition of two new food warmers and a refrigerator.

The new goods will allow the ISS to essentially become "a five- bedroom, two-bath residence for six," instead of a "three-bedroom, one bathroom home for three," the US space agency NASA said.

The mission will include four spacewalks, each expected to last more than six hours, to repair joints that allow the station's solar panels to rotate toward the sun and to install a nitrogen tank, a global positioning system and a camera outside the ISS.

One spacewalk will be devoted to removing a thermal cover from the Japanese Kibo module, which was installed on the ISS earlier this year. Astronauts will inspect Kibo's berthing mechanism to make sure it is ready to be expanded with the addition of another piece in 2009. The cover will then be reinstalled on the final spacewalk.

Endeavour astronaut Sandra Magnus will stay behind as a member of the ISS crew, and Greg Chamitoff will return to Earth with the seven- member crew after more than five months in space.

The shuttle is scheduled to undock from ISS on November 27, the day that the United States celebrates its Thanksgiving holiday. The return flight will be scheduled for landing on November 29 at Kennedy Space Centre on Cape Canaveral, Florida.

This will be the fourth flight this year by a US re-entry vehicle. (dpa)