If the launch succeeds, the Falcon Heavy will rank as the most powerful rocket in operation today, and the mightiest space vehicle to blast off from the United States since NASA's Saturn 5 rockets last carried astronauts to the moon 45 years ago.
It would likely give California-based SpaceX a leg up on rival commercial rocket companies seeking major contracts with NASA, the US military, satellite companies and even paying space tourists.
Propelled by 27 engines supplying three times the thrust of SpaceX's current workhorse Falcon 9 booster, the Falcon Heavy is essentially constructed from three Falcon 9s bolted together side-by-side, with the nose cone and payload capping the middle rocket.
The spacecraft is set for lift-off from launch complex 39A at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida - the same pad used by the Saturn 5 that carried Apollo 11's three-man crew on their historic 1969 mission culminating in Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin's first human steps on the lunar surface.
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