Star Trek fans remember him as the USS Enterprise's chief engineer, a no-nonsense Scot whose role at the controls of the ship's transporter system spawned one of sci-fi's most legendary catchphrases.

On Tuesday however, it will be the turn of actor James Doohan himself to be "beamed up" to where few have ventured before when his remains, and that of more than 300 hardcore space enthusiasts, are blasted into orbit aboard a privately owned rocket.

Space Exploration Technologies' Falcon 9 rocket is scheduled to lift off from Cape Canaveral in Florida carrying a 14.5-foot-tall (4.4-meter-tall) capsule called Dragon that is filled with food, clothes and supplies for the six astronauts and cosmonauts living aboard the International Space Station

The company, also known as SpaceX, replaced a faulty engine valve that triggered a last-second halt to its initial launch attempt on Saturday.

Tucked into Falcon 9 is a secondary payload, a container holding lipstick-tube-sized canisters filled with cremated remains. The deceased include Mercury astronaut Gordon Cooper, who died in 2004, as well as Doohan, the Canada-born actor who portrayed chief engineer Montgomery "Scotty" Scott on the original Star Trek television series. Doohan died in 2005.

If all goes as planned, nine minutes and 49 seconds after liftoff, Dragon's second stage will separate. It should spend the next year or so circling Earth as an orbital space memorial before it is pulled back into the atmosphere and incinerated.

Celestis Inc, a company based in Texas, has arranged for cremated remains to be flown in space 10 times previously, though not all the launches have been successful.

The Earth-orbiting space memorials cost about $3,000, while Celestis also arranges for suborbital flights and launches to the moon. Relatives are invited to attend the launch and then participate in a group memorial service.

The upcoming Falcon 9 flight is the firm's biggest yet, Charles Chafer, chief executive officer of parent company Space Services, wrote on his Facebook page. Ashes from 308 people are aboard, though most are reflights from a failed 2008 launch.

"With my Celestis team," Chafer posted on his Facebook page on Saturday, as the group gathered to watch the launch attempt.

"Ignition, no liftoff ... wow that was close. Try again Tuesday."

Chafer declined an interview request.

"We made a commitment not to comment publicly until after the mission," he wrote in an email to Reuters.