The new recycling system on the International Space Station finally appears to be working fine and the astronauts will be able to complete their tasks on time before the scheduled departure of shuttle Endeavour.

The issues with the extremely  expensive machine have caused quite the unease among the crew and also NASA’s observers. It took them more than five days to identify and fix the problem, which was related to the vibration grommets used to mount a centrifuge in the urine processor; the grommets were taken out and the crew managed to complete its tests.

"Now we're not going to be drinking this today," said shuttle commander Christopher Ferguson, presenting on camera the first batch of processed urine. The samples will be returned to Earth by shuttle Endeavour and carefully tested in order to make sure that the recycled water is fit for human consumption.

So far, the mission is considered a great success, as aside from the recycling machine, the ISS now features two new ’bedrooms’ and a new kitchen, which will be highly needed for NASA’s plans to enlarge the crew from three to six astronauts. Also, the spacewalks prepared to fix the broken rotary joint were completed without any significant incidents and the solar wing is now fully opperational.

Endeavour and the seven astronauts on board will be landing on Sunday at about 1:18 p.m.. NASA extended the mission by 24 hours for the astronauts to make sure that the urine, water and sweat processor works fine.